


Rumsey Hall

by germanjj



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, First Time, Horror, M/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-09
Updated: 2011-09-21
Packaged: 2017-10-23 14:19:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 44,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/251267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/germanjj/pseuds/germanjj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rumsey Hall. It sits in the middle of the historic district of Shepherdstown, West Virginia. It's big, a composite of separate phases of construction. It doesn't look like much, doesn't seem to be interesting at all. But once you're inside, once you close the wrong door, you might never find your way back out.<br/>Sam and Dean learn that the hard way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. prologue

**Author's Note:**

> **Based on:** this story is roughly based on "The Forever House" by Mark Rivers (1995). Which means I took the basic idea for the case and built my own story upon it.  
>  **Disclaimer:** This story is set in a real town, in a real building, talking about real (dead) people. Everything I know about the place and those people is from the internet, I've never been there, never knew any of those people or their ancestors. Everything said about those characters - their motivations, their flaws, their actions - it's completely made up and in no way intent to harm or hurt anyone.  
>  **Note:** In my little universe, photographs are totally normal roughly twenty years earlier than it actually happened. ;)

_Sioux Falls, South Dakota_

 

The rumble of the Impala was the first sound Bobby heard that day. Not the innocent singing of birds on the trees or the weather forecast on the radio; he heard the distinct sound of the old engine, piercing through the early morning silence, and it didn't mean anything good.

It never meant anything good.

"What happened?"

Bobby's own voice sounded like a gunshot echoing between the corpses of rusty old trucks, cars and buses, as he walked to meet Sam halfway.

Sam, carrying his unconscious brother in his arms, sporting a look like the apocalypse and hell had only been the beginning. He didn't answer.

Sam pushed past Bobby into the house, pausing in the hallway to get a tighter grip on Dean.

"Sam." Bobby followed, closing the door behind him, and finally Sam turned around and met the older man's gaze.

"Jeez, boy. What the hell happened?"

But Sam remained silent. His eyes spoke for him though, spoke of pain and suffering and Bobby couldn't even think of something that could have put that terrible look on the young man's face.

"Upstairs or downstairs?" Bobby asked eventually, dropping his earlier question. He nodded to Dean and thought about dragging that bed all the way down to the panic room, tried to remember if he had already repaired that damned heater there or not. He hoped that they wouldn't need the restraints, hoped he wouldn't have to cuff another winchester to a bed, waiting for what he might turn into.

"Upstairs. Dean's gonna be alright," Sam said, his voice husky and shredded and sounding horrible.

Bobby nodded. He didn't hide his relief.

The kid knew the way to the bedroom upstairs and Bobby couldn't help anymore than letting Sam turn around and carry his brother upstairs.

The young Winchester didn't so much as glance at him, like Bobby wasn't even there. Or, like Sam wasn't able to focus on anything but his brother.


	2. chapter a - part one

\-------------------------------  
 _Shepherdstown, West Virginia_

 

"This is it, Rumsey Hall," Sam says unnecessarily, getting out of the Impala in time with his brother, the door in his hand squealing as he throws it shut.

Dean glances towards him, follows the line of Sam's gaze.

"Huh," he makes, taking in the building hidden in shadows caused by the streetlights around it. But other than that... "Wow. That looks kinda boring."

"What?" Sam raises an eyebrow.

Dean motions to the house. "I mean, it's just a plain normal ... house. Isn't it supposed to look ... I don't know ... creepy?"

Whatever Sam plans to say gets hidden behind a cough and a roll of his eyes. He folds up the collar of his jacket to protect him from the wind, that is blowing around them heavily.

"I mean...," Dean gestures to the house, looking nothing more than that: Tall, with red bricks, a few chimneys and lots of white windows. "It’s supposed to be this huge haunted, scary house. I was expecting something... creepier."

Sam snorts, or maybe it's more of a dramatic sigh, but then Dean sees the faintest curl of a smirk on his brother's lips and Sam picks up the flashlight and the duffel and says," Let's go, Dean."

 

They find a way in easily enough. The building is actually made up of a few smaller houses, built and added over the years, and it has enough entries at the back, with wooden doors and some solid ones, a myriad of smaller and bigger windows, and Sam spots one that is already cracked open, and he fits himself in and crawls into an empty hallway. Dean follows right behind.

"Okay, what exactly are we looking for?" Dean asks as they follow a narrow corridor down to an open door.

"Troy McHarris, age 15," Sam starts listing the facts,"Missing for 36 hours, last seen by his friend, Sebastian, here in Rumsey Hall. They broke in on a dare by some friends, but when Sebastian wanted to leave, he couldn't find his friend anymore, searched for him for about half an hour, then went straight to the police."

"Smart kid," Dean comments and when he hears Sam snort, he adds, "except for the breaking and entering into haunted houses part."

"Sheriff Atkins told me today that it's the fourth official case involving this house, but about a dozen more people have vanished since 1873."

"Official?" Dean asks skeptically, but Sam turns around, rummages in his duffel for something until he pulls out his flashlight. The faint light from outside illuminates the hallway well enough, but Dean can already spot the room behind Sam, lying in shadows.

Dean snatches his own flashlight, the sudden shine harsh and strong against his brother's face.

Dean grins as Sam throws him an annoyed look, a classic bitchface, and there's this small voice inside Dean's head that tries to remember when he had last seen his brother wearing it.

"Official, because they searched the house countless times and never found anything." Sam goes on,"There are not many people that believe it's actually the house that made them all go missing."

"What does the Sheriff think?" Dean asks but his eyes follow the shine of the flashlight into a dusty old kitchen, bigger than most, hell, all, of their motel rooms. A smell of moldering wood greets them as they pass the threshold.

"Oh, he believes," Sam answers with a cough now from behind and when Dean turns to his brother, he can still see the dust swirling around him from where Sam touched the kitchen counter.

"Idiot," Dean mumbles and rolls his eyes.

"He is the County Sheriff. Came right here into town as soon as he heard the news about another one vanishing. So I figured it had to be something personal. And I was right. Atkins' nephew Richard vanished here in 2002," Sam explains, ignoring Dean's comment completely.

Dean grins to himself. There's nothing that can actually kill his joy over the fact that he has his brother back with him, all stupid jokes and everything. He missed this for far too long.

"Dean." Sam gets his brother's attention back. "For all that the Sheriff cares, we could accidently set this house on fire and he wouldn't even ask questions." Sam holds up his hands. "His words, not mine."

 

\-- + --

 

"How long did you say nobody's lived here?" Dean asks, the shine of his flashlight catching the layers of dust on the table and then white spots on the wall where pictures must have once decorated it.

"'bout thirty years."

"Yeah, pretty much looks like it." His eyes travel over the kitchen boards, colored in a cloudy grey, with more than one door hanging at a weird angle or ripped off completely. It smells old, too, like dust and stale air.

Sam walks over to the small, lean door in the back of the room, that is probably hiding another cupboard or a storage rack. Dean watches Sam's finger curl around the doorknob.

The door opens with a loud crack.

"Huh." Sam raises his flashlight and to Dean it looks like the darkness behind the door is trying to swallow the light. Worry flares right through him as Sam takes a step forward; it's short and faintly, quick enough that it's gone and forgotten the next moment.

"Stairs," Sam announces, his voice already creating an echo from a few steps down.

Dean hurries to follow when he hears the heavy footsteps of his brother fading.

"Don't think the kid has been here," Dean says, but keeps on walking anyway. Sam is already around a corner.

"What?" he whispers when he reaches him again. Sam has stopped, his head is tilted like he is listening to something, and he has a finger on his lips showing Dean to be quiet.

"Voices." Dean nods when he hears it too. It's faint and the howling of the wind inside the building is making it hard to hear, but Dean can make out at least two people talking to each other.

There are three doors going off this hallway, but only one has a streak of dust smeared across the door handle.

It only takes a quick meeting of their eyes, a short nod and hands at to their guns before they push through the door together, ready to shoot.

Two very high, very female screams stop them mid-motion.

"Don't shoot! Please, don't shoot us!" the taller one pleads, both girls having their hands raised. They're looking at them in fear, Sam's flashlight illuminating their scared faces. They're standing close together in a room stuffed full with boxes and bags, furniture covered with sheets in one corner and three huge barrels in the other.

It's a storage room, but from the dust lying around, not one that has been used lately.

Sam and Dean share a short glance and put away their guns. Dean sees Sam go for the fake ID in his jacket and does the same.

"FBI," Dean announces, his voice sure and strong enough to convince them easily; they've been doing this for way too long now. "This is Agent Meehan and I'm Agent Pangborn. Can I ask what you're doing here, ladies?"

They flash their fake badges and fake smiles and that seems to ease the girls up a little.

The shorter one takes a step forward. "I'm Lauren McHarris, this is my best friend Buffy Lafayette." She takes a long shaking breath, but Dean has to bite his tongue, doesn't even need to look over to know that Sam's throwing him a warning glance. "We're looking for my brother."

Next to Dean, Sam clears his throat. "Miss McHarris, so are we. But it's too dangerous for you to be walking around here at night."

"Not to mention, forbidden," Dean adds.

"Excuse me," Sam goes on, does his whole 'I'm-a-nice-guy-and-looking-at-you-with-my-dooey-eyes-so-you-do-whatever-I-want'-schmuck, "but we need you to leave now."

And of course it works.

The girl who has called herself Lauren, picks up the backpack that has been lying at her feet and then they walk, albeit slowly, to the door leading back to the hallway and the kitchen.

"We'll do our best to find him," Sam promises with an almost genuine smile when they walk past them, and Dean only hopes that they won't find him dead. Or as a monster. Or both.

"Dude," Dean tells Sam under his breath, barely withholding a giggle, as soon as the girls are out of earshot, "her name is Buffy."

Sam only shakes his head, but he can't fool him. Dean hears the smile when his brother answers, "You're unbelievable, Dean."

 

\-- + --

 

"Hands where I can see 'em!"

Sam and Dean jump around at the sudden shout and see the girls raise their own hands in the air, again, a squeak of surprise coming from both of them.

There's a tall man entering the room, maybein his mid-fifties, with his gun raised, and only when Dean aims the flashlight at him, can he see the uniform the man is wearing.

"Sheriff Atkins, it's me, Agent Meehan," Sam greets him, taking a step forward so the other man can see him properly. "We talked today about the McHarris - case?"

The Sheriff looks from Sam to Dean, then back. "That your partner?" he asks, nodding shortly to Dean.

"Yeah, that's Agent Pangborn."

"So what the hell is going on here? Mr. Johnson from next door called about a break-in?"

"We're not breaking - in here, Sheriff. We did not come to steal anything," Buffy explains immediately, huddling closer to her friend.

The Sheriff points his own flashlight at them. He sighs.

"Lauren McHarris, what the hell are you doing here?" he asks, but he does it, already knowing the answer.

"We're trying to find Troy," Lauren says and raises her chin.

"They were just about to leave, Sheriff," Dean chimes in for the rescue, even throws a smile on top.

The Sheriff eyes him suspiciously, then he turns to Sam. "I know what the girls are doing here, but what about you?"

"The same," Dean answers for his brother. "We're checking out the house, trying to find something that will help us to find Troy McHarris."

"In the middle of the night?" Atkins asks, and he sounds both surprised and disbelieving.

"Umm," Dean stutters, fervently looking for an explanation.

"Sheriff, we're trying not to waste any more time," Sam answers next to him, smoothly, and his voice is tough like stone and shuts the Sheriff right up.

There's a noise growing louder from the hallway behind the Sheriff, and Dean realizes that it's the wind picking up.

The door rattles, the rusty hinges adding to the noise.

"Sheriff," Sam starts, and Dean is actually a little impressed and a little creeped out at how well he's pulling that voice off.

If he's honest with himself, it reminds him a lot of the Sam that was parading around without an ounce of soul inside his thick skull.

Dean tries to suppress the shudder that's threatening to run through his body.

"If you could please get the girls home safe, so we can do our job here."

Dean watches the older man clench his jaw, but Atkins doesn't say anything, only nods. The girls are waiting anxiously in the corner, their eyes traveling from the Sheriff to the brothers and back.

When the Sheriff turns, the noise from outside gets even louder. The door swings halfway shut.

"Holy Hell," Dean hears the Sheriff swear. "Let's go, girls. They've been talking about the storm coming all day. We should not be driving around when it hits."

The three of them take another step forward, and that's when the wind picks up again. The cracked window upstairs and the doors here must have created an air draft, because the next second, the door gets pulled around by the force of it.

And then the door falls shut.

 

\-- + --

 

Dean feels the hairs on his arms raise for a moment, when the slam of the door still echoes through the storage room. He's feeling it again, the flash of worry, just like in the kitchen some minutes ago.

It's gone when the Sheriff opens it back up and he and the girls leave.

Sam lets out a breath he was holding next to him. "Man, that was close."

Dean throws his brother an appreciative look. He considers telling him how good he did for a second, but shrugs it off with a grin.

"What?" Sam asks, squirming a little under Dean's gaze and Dean would be lying if he said he didn't enjoy riling Sam up so easily.

"Nothin'," he says innocently. "Okay, let's start this thing."

"You think anybody's missing this stuff?" Sam asks and follows the shine of his flashlight with his eyes.

"It sure is a hell of a lot." Dean takes a few steps into the room, and tries not to stumble over the boxes stacked into small and bigger towers all around him. He stops at an open one full of framed pictures.

"Dude, looks like a collection of family pictures," he says out loud and rummages through his discovery. There are quite a few of them in the box, each showing a variation of portrayed family pictures, sometimes a few generations, sometimes only two boys.

There are a lot of the two boys.

They are shown in different stages of age, too. Old pictures, where they are sitting next to each other in school uniforms and smiling, and younger ones, with them standing in suits, wearing blank faces.

"Weird, that nobody misses these," Sam whispers, and he's right next to Dean, his words hitting Dean's ear, and Dean starts.

"Dude," he swears and glares at his brother.

Sam shrugs, a smirk in his eyes. "Let’s check the other rooms. It doesn't look like the kid's been inside this one."

Sam is outside first, heading down the hallway, away from the stairs. He tries the next door, jarring it a few times, and then pauses when nothing happens.

"Did you hear that?" Sam turns towards Dean, tilting his head like he's trying to listen to something far away.

Dean shrugs. "Didn't hear anything, Sam," he answers truthfully and watches his brother's brows furrow.

"Alright. Let's go on." Sam shakes his head like he's shaking a weird feeling off, but then he turns back to the next door they haven't tried yet and Dean simply follows.

Or, at least, wants to.

"Agents?" a shout comes from upstairs. "Agents, you gotta see this!"

"What the ...?" Dean doesn't finish his sentence. The brothers head upstairs, finding the girls and the Sheriff still in the kitchen.

"What's up?"

"Look at this," Lauren answers, and her voice is thin. Dean doesn't see anything obvious that could have gotten her so freaked out, but then she takes a deep breath, seems to ready herself for something.

"What's going on here?" Dean asks again, his eyes traveling through the room. Buffy's face is pale, even in the dark shadow she's standing in, and the Sheriff doesn't look much better either.

"Dean, look," Sam whispers next to him, pointing at the door the brunette just let go of.

It's the door to the hallway, the only other door in this kitchen. It hangs pretty loose in its hinges, swings back and forth now, the crack getting smaller and smaller.

"What the...?" Dean makes again, takes a step closer.

It's what he sees in the crack that makes his mouth stand open and his eyes squint with concentration.

What he sees, what they all can see through the gap, is not the hallway they all came from. It's not a hallway at all.

It's someplace else.

 

\-- + --

 

It's lighter in there, like the sun is shining in from outside and the room is not long and narrow, but wide. The floor Dean can see is wooden, and there is a table. It looks like a dining room, only without the chairs.

Lauren finally stops the door and opens it wide. The hallway lies behind it: dark and innocently.

Everything is just as it was.

"You saw that, right?" Buffy asks. She has her arms slung around her body, rubbing them as if she's freezing.

"There's more," the Sheriff announces darkly and motions for Sam and Dean to follow him.

He walks into the hall and aims his flashlight to the wall. He doesn't say anything when he turns to face them again.

"The windows!" Sam takes his own flashlight and illuminates the wall, as if that would change anything. As if that would explain anything.

"They're gone." Atkins says, his voice rough. "The windows are gone."

"We just came through here," Dean states unnecessarily, because they all know it.

They all remember crawling through the one cracked window here in this hallway.

And now the windows are gone and the wall is blank.

Dean walks back into the kitchen, keeps looking around, keeps looking for clues of what they missed but he can't find anything.

"Dean." Sam stops him in his tracks with a hand on his arm and when Dean looks up, his brother is pointing to the kitchen walls.

Which are no longer empty.

"Okay, seriously, what the hell, Sam?" There are four huge pictures of the same scenery on the wall. A house, Rumsey Hall, Dean notices, drawn in various stages.

There are four huge pictures on the same wall where, not even half an hour ago, only white spots had been.

"We took the wrong turn," Buffy explains, her voice shaking and betraying the confidence she's trying to wear. "Maybe they have two kitchens here; maybe we just took the wrong turn."

"Or someone else is here?" Lauren adds. "Maybe they put the pictures up while we were downstairs? To mess with us?"

Dean watches Sam shake his head.

"Look at the furniture. The counter is whole, the doors look almost new. The paint isn't splintered, the drawers are all there, even the dust is gone."

The room falls silent at Sam's words, everyone's busy looking at the things he pointed out.

"So it's another kitchen," Buffy says, hopefully, her voice growing stronger.

Dean doesn't answer. Neither does Sam.

His brother walks up to him, stands close enough that they can talk without being heard.

"Dean, it's not another kitchen and you know it," Sam tells him, their eyes locking. "It's the same kitchen. Only ... earlier."

"Yeah, I know," Dean hisses. "And that's damn well impossible!"

"What are we gonna do now?" Lauren asks and looks at Dean, three other sets of eyes also settling on him.

Dean growls low in his throat and looks at them. "Find another damn way out."

 

\-- + --

 

They decide not to enter the hall again and instead search for another way out of the building. One by one, the group goes back down the stairs into the smaller corridor.

They take a right turn and follow the hall to a dead end. There's only a small window up high, secured with a grid and some boards. On the other side there is the storage room they've already seen and the second door, the one that is tightly locked.

They try the third one.

"Please," Dean mumbles under his breath as he pushes down the heavy handle and pulls. It's different from the other two doors which look strong but not thick and both have thin wooden handles.

This door is at least twice as thick, with a handle made of very heavy metal.

Sam steps in to help and together they manage to pull it open, pull it all the way back.

Just to reveal another storage room.

"Great," Dean says, but he takes the first step in.

This one is almost empty. There is only one large chest in the corner, made of dark red wood reminicent of a pirate's chest, only missing the stolen gold. Dean doesn't see another door at first glance, but this room is bigger and seems to go on around the corner.

The others follow behind him.

"Hey, there's another door," Sam notices, already having crossed the first part of the room in a few steps.

"Can you open it?" Buffy follows him, sounding a little livelier than before. Lauren is right behind her, both girls walking up to Sam, who's reaching out for the door.

The Sheriff is the last one to enter and Dean turns around to check on him when he moans, sees the way the older man is trying to get a grip on the door that's too heavy for him and threatening to fall shut.

Dean takes a few steps to help, to catch the weight of the door together.

He's not fast enough.

The door falls closed, makeing a dark, damped sound when it latches in its frame.

And suddenly the room ...

changes.

 

"This can't ... it can't be real," Amy whispers and her voice gets stuck in her throat.

Sam gasps across from Dean and Dean doesn't see what got his brother so shocked, only sees the naked terror in Sam's eyes.

Except then Dean turns and takes a look at the room, really sees what it's become. As if his mind needed another minute to catch up.

"Dean, do you ... can you?" Sam is by his side, his eyes traveling frantically between him and some spot on the wall.

A spot between two huge windows, pieces of white paint peeling from their frame, barely hidden by long, thick red curtains. And Outside.

Outside, it's a bright, sunny day.

Dean can't even nod, can't even say 'yes, yes, I see it. I can see it.'

He looks down. There's a wooden floor beneath his feet where not even a minute ago only a stone floor had been.

Other than that, the room is completely empty.

And when Dean turns around to the Sheriff, the door they let fall shut has vanished.

"Holy ...," Dean doesn't even finish his sentence. He just stares at the blank spot on the wall where there is not even the smallest hint that there had once been a door.

"Dean," Sam breathes and when Dean meets his eyes, his brother is blinking heavily.

Dean takes a step towards him. "Sam, what..."

"It's gone," Lauren shrieks suddenly and the sound cuts through Dean's ears, making his head jerk around.

"The door," she explains and her shaking hand is pointing to the spot where the other door had been, the one Sam was about to open.

"This is a freaking nightmare." The low rumble of Sheriff Atkins's voice hits Dean from the side. The old man is rubbing his eyes, as if that would make it all go away, as if the old storage room just would come back.

But, despite the craziness of everything, the room feels pretty damn real.

"There's something in the air, right?" Buffy asks and she's laughing and grinning, and Dean sees that she's pretty close to losing it completely. "I mean, maybe they put some drugs in the air and we're breathing this all in and now we're hallucinating, right?" She keeps babbling on, and Lauren is turning towards her, a smile on her face like she's all too happy to believe that explanation.

"I wish," Dean growls and isn't that the bitch of it all? That in the life he leads, he knows that they're not hallucinating.

It is happening. It is real.

 

\-- + --

 

"Alright," Dean starts. "We need to stay calm and focused, everyone. Understood?" He doesn't know if he can do it himself. Feels a trace of panic creep up the back of his neck because this? This is so much different from anything else he's encountered. Give him a monster, hell, give him a demon any day and he at least will know what he's up against.

Trapped in this house he doesn't even know who the enemy is.

He wipes his hand over his face, tries to get rid of the doubts piling up inside his head, tries to get a clear mind and then he suddenly sees it. Another door, almost completely hidden from view from one of the curtains.

"That way." He nods in the direction of the door and takes the first step.

The doorknob feels cold in his hand and Dean turns it slowly, his whole body tense and ready to fight.

To fight whatever might lay behind that door.

 

It opens with a small creaking sound to a strange room, filled with items stuffed in every corner. At second glance, it seems to be a study, and the things Dean sees in all the boxes and glass cases and cabinets are ... bugs. Hundreds and hundreds of them, all collected with their Latin names neatly written under every piece.

Dean shudders. "Freaks," he mumbles, but takes a step over the threshold.

He realizes he's still using his flashlight although this room is also filled with sunlight, the shine of his light not even visible. There's only a small window over the desk and Dean can see another wall a few feet behind it, like from another building, but the sunlight falls through the gap between this building and the other, illuminating the whole scary room.

"It's safe," he announces and puts his flashlight back into the duffel he's still carrying over his shoulder.

The group follows him haltingly. Sam is first, then the girls, walking close together; then the Sheriff following behind them.

There is the next door, between a huge board and a stack of small boxes. It's the only other one, so they don't have much of a choice. The room behind that one looks like a bigger copy of the first, only less packed.

There are two doors. Dean decides to go for the right one.

They never close any doors, they leave them all wide open and nobody talks about it, everyone just makes sure that these can't fall shut at any moment.

They pass a myriad of different rooms and hallways, kitchens and cellars and bathrooms. Some looking alike, some like they’re not even from the same century, let alone the same house.

They continue to walk, although Dean is aware that they don't actually know where they're going. But he needs to keep walking, needs to keep them walking, until they come up with something better.

They can't just sit around and wait.

Sam stays next to him the whole time, silent and focused, but Dean can see him twitch every now and then from the corner of his eyes, and he thinks that maybe this is Sammy's weak spot, the thing his little brother is actually afraid of: Haunted houses.

It doesn't make it any better when Dean suddenly hears something, feels a shift in the atmosphere.

His brother tenses, straightens with his steps and glances towards him.

"Do you feel it too?" he whispers, the girls and the Sheriff only steps behind them.

Dean nods shortly, but knows his brother has seen it. "We're not alone anymore."

 

\-- + --

 

They eventually stop for a breather.

It's another neutral room: Just four walls and a stained carpet on the floor. It's a long room, Dean can't see the end from where he stands. There is no furniture and the only window shows a forest outside, coated in thick fog, a forest which most definitely wasn't outside when they first came into town.

The girls hold on to each other in a corner and Dean can see how they're trying to keep it together, trying not to cry. The Sheriff doesn't look much better . The old man's face is pale, his eyes wide with shock.

But it's Sam who twitches when they let the door fall shut, whose eyes are even worse than the Sheriff's for a second.

"Sam? Are you alright?" Dean throws him a worried look; Sam is wearing his pinched face; the one Dean has learned early on only meant trouble.

It takes a moment until Sam seems to hear him. His brother shudders and jerks his head around. "I'm ... I'm fine."

Dean doesn't believe him for a second. Sam stares at him weirdly, a look Dean can't quite decipher. "You don't look so hot right now, Sam. You remember anything?" Dean hopes not, prays not.

"I said, I'm fine, Dean."

It's not better this time, Sam's voice is still shaky but Dean lets it go for now. He feels everyone's eyes on them, so he walks past his brother, places a comforting hand on his shoulder and hopes it will do for now.

"Oh my God!"

In the middle of the room, there is a man.

Dean can't see his face, but he sees the gun pointing right at him.

"Down!"

The shout rings loud through the big room and Dean doesn't have the time to check if his orders are followed. He lunges forward and crashes into the man, pulling him down with him to the floor and he's met with a weird sort of resistance. The man is not like a normal ghost but he's also not really ... solid.

Dean doesn't have the time to dwell on that either.

"Dean!" He hears Sam's voice and when Dean looks up, his brother is standing by another door, the others already behind him.

"Son of a..." Dean swears and kicks the ... creature beneath him. He struggles to get up, but he's somehow fast enough, gets on his feet first and runs through the room just in time to glide through the door.

He hears Sam close it behind him.

He sees the room change around him.

They're in another hallway now. The door Sam is still standing next to is firmly closed, and also the only one Dean can see. A torch is right next to it, the fire flickering and creating dancing shadows on all their scared faces. Beyond that, Dean can only see darkness. He doesn't know where the other side of the room ends.

If it does end.

"What the ..." Lauren's voice pierces through the rough silence. "What the hell was that?"

"I don't know." Sam shakes his head but his eyes are solely trained on Dean.

"Yeah, well, me neither." Dean gets up from the floor and rubs his dirty hands off his jeans. "Everybody alright?"

His question earns him a few hesitated nods and that's all he'll get, but it's enough.

"It's coming," Sam whispers behind him and a second later, they all can hear it.

Footsteps behind the door. Coming closer.

"We gotta go," the Sheriff says and although he doesn't sound too happy about it, Dean can only agree. He eyes the dark corridor suspiciously and curses silently that it is the only option they have.

"Shit." He hears Sam from behind him.

"My flashlight is dead," his brother explains when Dean meets Sam's eyes.

"Mine too," Buffy's voice chimes in, right when Dean wants to make a snarky comment. He keeps quiet though, reaching for his own flashlight and testing it.

"Terrific," he bites out when he flips the switch and nothing happens.

"Everyone's?" He looks into the group, although he already knows the answer deep down. The others don't disappoint.

"Damnit!"

The door behind Sam rattles with the force of someone banging against it. Not hard, not yet, but Dean doesn't want to stay a moment longer.

"Looks like we got no other option," Sam states and moves past him to grab the torch from the wall.

The torch doesn't give way easily. Sam seems to need all of his strength to pry the wood away from the old metal. But he gets it out in three hard tugs and turns back to the group.

"Let's go," he orders and Dean rolls his eyes. He hates what the night is turning into, walking down a dark, unknown corridor that shouldn't even be here in the first place, but he gets in motion like the rest of the group and follows his brother away from the door.

 

\-- + --

 

The light finally dies.

Dean has long lost his sense of time, but they must have followed the corridor for at least an hour, which is mind-numbingly crazy just on its own.

Nothing ever changed in that hour. The corridor still looked the same, blank empty walls made of stone, dust and dirt in the corners. It smelled of stale air and the only noises they heard were the ones they were making.

Sam had looked alarmed at one point, throwing Dean a warning glance and then looking up to the torch. The flame had been getting smaller and smaller during the last few minutes.

It's with a last slow glow that the fire eventually ceases to burn.

Dean hears Lauren draw in a sharp breath and Buffy begin to sob silently.

"Everybody stay calm," he says and hates how his voice bounces off the naked walls.

He can hear Sam next to him. His brother is walking close to him, probably closer than necessary, and maybe Dean should point that out to him, but he doesn't.

Their arms brush every now and then as they keep following the corridor that never seems to end. Dean finds that he can distinguish Sam's breathing from the other's, he even thinks he is able to feel his warmth next to him, or maybe this place is finally getting to him; maybe he's finally going crazy.

"Wait." A hand suddenly grabs Dean's arm, Sam's hand, and the whole group comes to a halt.

He hears Sam take another step, hears his brother feel around, feels him move around.

He never lets go of Dean.

"It goes down here," Sam announces.

"What?" comes the question from behind them. Dean hears Sheriff Atkins take another step towards them, as if he could take a closer look.

"Yeah," Sam says. "Seems like a spiral staircase," he adds.

"Do we know what's down there?" Buffy pipes up.

Dean rolls his eyes and is glad that no one can see it.

"We can't go back," Sam answers and that seals it.

"Stay close together."

Sam takes the first step and when he lets go of Dean's arm, for a second, Dean wants to reach out for his brother again.

This darkness is definitely making him crazy.

Dean follows right behind, he can hear Lauren and Buffy take the steps after him, then Atkins is last.

They walk the first few minutes in silence. The stairs are winding down and down, don't seem to end.

They find a steady rhythm, Sam and Dean first, the girls and the Sheriff walking slower.

 

Minutes, hours later, Dean hears his brother's breath hitch. It's not loud; maybe the girls and the Sheriff behind him didn't even notice anything. But Dean heard it, and the falter in Sam's step.

"Sam?" he whispers and the next second he bumps into him.

Sam is like a solid wall, and Dean curses inwardly when his knee hits Sam's calf. "What is it?" he asks and his breath hits Sam's neck, his nose tingling where his brother’s hair is brushing over it.

Sam only lets out a shaky breath.

"Everything okay?" Lauren asks from above them. They're a little further behind but they can probably hear that Sam and Dean are not walking anymore.

"It's nothing, keep going," Dean answers for the both of them.

"Come on, Sam, we gotta go," he whispers to his brother, pushing him gently with a hand to his arm.

"Dean," Sam says and he sounds off, his voice sounds strangled, but he moves again, following the steps further down.

And then Dean hears the footsteps.

He hears it a second before the others do, before Buffy sobs loudly and Lauren whispers to herself 'no, no, no, please no'.

"We gotta hurry," he says to Sam and immediately hears his brother's steps quicken.

"Faster," he tells the rest of the group and they all but run down the stairs, each one creating noise against the metal staircase.


	3. chapter a - part two

The darkness is like a brick wall around them. Nothing to see, not even a shimmer of light breaking in.

But, they can hear.

Despite the sounds of their own hurried steps and ragged, hysteric breathing, they can all hear the footsteps following them, slow but heavy. Steady.

Like whatever is following them has all the time in the world.

Like it will catch them anyhow.

 

"Watch out!" Sam shouts suddenly and again Dean crashes into him.

"Jeez!" he curses, but then he can feel what Sam meant. Ground. Solid, even ground.

They're finally at the bottom.

"Where to now?" Sam asks next to him and he has his head turned, his breath hitting Dean’s face.

Dean reaches out his arms, trying to feel for what is in front of him. There's a wall to his left, clammy and cold but nothing in front of them.

"Stay close," Dean orders again, hearing the girls and the Sheriff behind him, Sam is next to him.

He takes a careful step forward, arms outstretched in front of him, then another step. His heart is beating like a sledgehammer in his chest, the adrenaline making everything sharper around him. He can't see, but he can hear and smell and feel.

"This way," Dean says shortly, the everlasting rhythm of steps still above them. It sounds like a clock ticking.

Dean doesn't want to know what will happen when it stops.

The group is following him slowly. They can't be fast, can't risk thoughtless steps. For all they know, they could be walking the edge of a giant abyss.

"Damnit," Dean whispers when his hands hit another wall. This one is colder than the other wall next to the stairs, but it's dry and smooth, not rippled and dirty like the stone.

"This way," Sam says, his voice low, and he's walking to the left, putting a small distance between them.

Dean hurries to follow.

They all walk along the wall by touching it, anticipating each step with their hands. It's easier that way, faster.

They follow it for awhile. The wall takes turns, soft curves rather than sudden corners.

And there is a smell now.

'Roses', Dean thinks and wrinkles his nose. It doesn't smell good. Too much, too intense and it's attacking his stomach already. It's like being buried under a field of flowers in full blossom.

Lauren coughs somewhere next to Dean, and Buffy hisses, telling her to stay silent.

The footsteps are different now.

Whatever it is that's following them has reached the bottom of the stairs now.

And it doesn't seem to need light to know where to go.

"Fuck," the Sheriff curses under his breath as the steps take up speed, heavy boots hitting the ground, every step sounding ten feet closer than the other.

"No, please," Buffy cries and she's trying to stay calm, to stay strong, Dean can hear it, but he has a hard time to stay focused himself.

They're in pitch blackness, with no idea who, what, the enemy is. There's no way they can win this if this thing gets to them first.

"Dean," Sam says and he sounds alarmed but excited too and Dean reaches out a hand, feels for his brother. He catches Sam's elbow, follows his arm down to where it's holding on to something.

A doorknob.

"Do I open it?" his brother asks him and Dean turns his head to the darkness they just came from, listens to the footsteps.

"Only chance," he answers and then Sam turns the knob and pulls.

 

\-- + --

 

Bright, screaming light attacks them immediately. They all gasp, try to turn away instinctively, hiding their eyes.

But there's no time.

The footsteps are picking up, the thing is running now. Coming closer.

"In, in, in!" Dean shouts, makes sure to push everyone through the door even though he has no idea what lies behind it, no idea what they're running into.

What they're running away from is more important right now.

"Dean!" Sam shouts from inside, staring at him with wide eyes and Dean has only a second to think that his brother is seeing the thing behind him now, can see what's following them, before he's jumping forward, crashing into the room.

He loses his balance, falls to the floor with his duffel catching the worst of it, and he jerks around, watches Sam slam the door shut and press himself against it.

"Let go of the knob!" Lauren screams and Dean will be impressed later, for she figured it all out before them, but now he's busy watching Sam letting go of it as if he was touching fire, has only a last moment to see the kind of cell they're in before the room turns into something else.

 

They're standing in silence for a long, breathless minute.

"It's not following," Buffy states and her eyes flicker to the door that's still behind Sam.

A different door, maybe, but they all did not have the time to check.

The room is most definitely different though.

The light is still there, coming from the sun that sits high in the sky behind the two large windows. They're in the middle of a meadow, rich green grass surrounding them from what Dean can see. The room is almost empty but the walls are decorated with flowery tapestry.

There's a door between the two windows, a simple thin brown door separating them from the outside.

Buffy sees it too, walks over in two steps and pulls the door handle.

The door doesn't give.

"Come on, come on," she pleads as she shakes and jiggles the handle, pulling and prying but nothing happens. The door doesn't open.

"Please," Buffy sobs, "please." Her voice is going up a notch, growing hysteric.

"Buffy," her friend says, takes a step towards her. The others just keep on staring, the air filled with fear and desperation.

Dean can almost taste it.

"Let me out!" Buffy screams, screams at the top of her lungs and she is kicking the door now, hitting it with her tiny fists. Then she runs over to the window, trying the same.

"Hey, hey, stop that."

Sam is faster than Dean, pulls her away from the window effortlessly and sits her down in the middle of the room, pushing her gently to the floor where she just slumps and starts crying.

Lauren is with her immediately, wrapping her up in her arms.

"We don't even know where that outside is, kiddo," Atkins tells the crying girl and maybe it's meant to be soothing, but his words don't make it any better.

Dean slowly rises from the floor. His eyes travel to his brother, catching Sam the moment he jerks and presses his eyes closed as if he's seen something. But when Dean turns around he only sees a wall made of boards, with the sunlight shining through every crack.

"Sam," Dean says low enough for only his brother to hear. If it's Hell, if Sam's remembering Hell, if the damn wall inside his head is cracking, Dean needs to know it now.

He's pretty sure that his brother can read all that from the look on his face.

"I'm fine, Dean," Sam promises but he's a shitty liar.

Dean sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. He feels drained already, and tired, the adrenaline burning his fuel way too fast. He walks over to a bench, one of two in this room, bare, but with little ornaments carved into them.

He sits down and buries his face in his hands for a moment. Just to catch his breath, to take a short timeout.

When he looks up again, three sets of eyes are focused on him.

"Sam?" Dean asks again, because Sam has turned away from them; Dean can only see his profile, but it's enough to know that Sam's found something.

Dean gets up.

"Lauren?" Sam finally turns around. "What was that about the doorknob?"

The brunette looks up to them from her spot on the floor, wet patches on her shirt and Buffy still in her arms.

"I ... the room," she starts, her eyes flickering from Sam to Dean and back. "I think when you ... when you close the door the room changes, but ... when you let go of it, it ... I don't know, goes someplace else. I can't ... explain it, it was just an idea. I figured ... I figured if the room changed completely, this ... thing couldn't follow us any longer."

Sam and Dean share a silent glance.

"I wanna try something," Sam announces and goes back to the door where they came from.

He opens it without hesitation, opens it wide, and Buffy whimpers behind them, the Sheriff also gasping.

There is another room like this one behind it. It doesn't have a bench, only a table, big enough for twelve people and one chair sitting in the corner. There is another window on the right side, showing the same scenery as in the first room.

"Okay," Sam turns around, talks to Atkins. "I'm going in there and you close the door."

"Sam," Dean starts immediately, not liking the idea for one second.

"...and then you count to ten and open it again, okay?" Sam keeps talking to the Sheriff but his eyes are on his brother now. "Don't let go of the doorknob, no matter what."

The only thing Dean can do is clench his jaw and stay silent.

He knows Sam has a point. They have to figure out how this works. How this nightmare comes together.

"Alright," Sheriff Atkins agrees and follows Sam to next room. He waits until Sam seems to be ready and then he closes the door in front of him.

"One," he starts counting, as Dean does the same in his head.

"Two, three ...," the girls count with them and Dean turns to them, sees them clinging to each other, holding each other's hands, their eyes trained on the closed door.

Dean takes a deep breath, tells himself that everything will be okay.

"Seven, Eight, Nine," he keeps counting under his breath. "Ten."

The Sheriff rips the door open the second before Dean is ready to push forward and do it himself.

Sam turns around, his brows furrowed. "It didn't change."

 

\-- + --

 

"What?" Dean takes a step forward. "Are you sure, Sammy?"

Sam only tilts his head in a silent answer, giving Dean a look.

"Let's try the next."

There are two doors in the second room, one plain, like the other in the left corner, the other painted in a yellowish tone, almost sitting right across from the first door.

They try the left one first.

Sam goes in again, but it's Dean who closes the door, and counts to ten.

When he opens it, Sam is still standing in a room that seems to be used for cooking and washing, with a high table in the center, two large bowls embedded in the corners, shaking his head again. "Nothing," he states, worrying his lip between his teeth.

They try the yellow door.

"... nine, ten," Dean counts and pushes the door handle down, swinging the door open.

Sam is staring at him wide eyed, his face pale and he's panting, panting as if he'd been running.

"Jesus." Dean hauls him in, pulling his brother on his sleeve and getting him back into the room.

Although at the moment, the only thing that is sitting behind the yellow door is a small bedroom, containing only one bed, too small to be for a grown person.

"What did you see?" Buffy comes forward. Her hand is still clutching Lauren's, but the girls are standing now and Buffy had wiped away all traces of tears on her face.

"It changed, it changed into…," Sam starts, trying to get his breathing under control, "into another kitchen but it was burned, the whole kitchen was almost burned to pieces." He's rubbing his face, his nose, and Dean suspects he's trying to get rid of the smell of fire and ash.

"Okay, let's try something else." Dean walks back into room number one. He tests the bench he had been sitting on earlier. It's not too heavy, so he pulls it up and drags it over.

He pushes the door to the bedroom wide open, securing it against the wall with the bench. He doesn't want this door to close, doesn't have the desire to see the burned down kitchen for himself.

"Let's try this one," he says from inside the bedroom. He'd caught sight of this tiny door when Sam had walked in. It's a little hidden from view, right next to the other one. It's not very high and even Dean must probably duck to walk through; and it's light blue, with the paint peeling off in some spots.

"I'll go in," he announces and Sam doesn't argue.

They share a short nod, Dean trusting Sam to do the counting this time and then Dean opens the little blue door.

The room is nothing spectacular, looking like another version of room number one and two. It's a little smaller, with two chairs sitting in the middle facing each other.

Dean steps in, takes a deep breath and waits for Sam to close the door.

The room changes immediately.

It grows larger, maybe even twice as long as the original, and the walls change from the tapestry to stark white, the floor changing from wood to grey tiles. Except for a large wardrobe in one corner, the room is completely empty.

Dean lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding.

There are three other doors, one for each wall and Dean looks at them closely, something nagging in the back of his mind, but the room changes back: Sam opening the door behind him before he realizes what it is.

"What did you see?" Sam asks and Dean sees the other three looming behind him.

"Just another room. Bigger, three more doors," Dean shrugs, "Nothing special."

Sam nods to him. "So then let’s try this."

They all enter the room now, Buffy carrying Dean's bag. He thanks her and takes it back; he had totally forgotten about it.

"Alright, close the door, but don't let go of the knob, okay?" Sam asks Lauren as soon as they're all in.

Dean watches Lauren's hesitated nod, watches her slowly, disturbingly slowly, close the door.

They all hear the click when it finally rests in its frame.

They all see the room change.

Dean tries to watch it this time, to see if it's a sudden change, or if it's ... morphing into something else. But it happens as always. One second, there is the room with the two chairs and he only blinks once and they're in the other room with the dresser, he has seen only minutes ago.

"Open it," Sam tells Lauren under his breath.

The room changes back.

"This is a nightmare," the Sheriff says again, shaking his head. Buffy rubs her arms as if she's freezing again, but she still looks more collected than a few minutes earlier.

"Now again," Sam says and Lauren nods. "And this time, let go of the doorknob, okay?"

Lauren reacts fast this time, closes the door in one swift motion and the room with the four doors is back.

But when Lauren let's go, door number four is gone.

 

\-- + --

 

"You were right," Dean tells Lauren but she doesn't really look like she's too happy about it.

"So we can check every room we're walking into," Sam explains. "And if it's dangerous or whatever, we can change it right back."

Dean nods, wiping over his mouth again. It's a start. It's at least something they can work with.

Dean has one more idea though.

"Let's rest for ten minutes," he announces to the group and then he turns his eyes to his brother. "I need to talk to you."

They open the first random door, the golden handle lying cool in Dean's hand, and a room filled with dresses and little shoeboxes opens before them.

They don't close the door, of course not, but Dean is leaving it ajar enough that it's safe but still private. There's a question burning on the tip of his tongue when he looks at his brother.

"Did you see it?" he asks, but that's not it, that's not the real question.

"You mean the ... thing?" Sam nods. "I did, just ... it was the same guy from before but how can that be, Dean? The guy with a gun was a ghost, must have been a ghost, but ...."

"...but a ghost can't make this much noise with his own two feet," Dean finishes for his brother. "Beats me, Sam."

He shrugs and looks up to his brother, sees Sam flinch again. It's barely there but Dean did see it.

"So, you're gonna tell me what’s wrong with you?"

Dean swears that he sees the tiniest hint of guilt flicker over Sam's face. But it's gone too quickly and replaced by a well-trained mask of utter disbelief.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Sam answers and his brother can maybe fool everybody and their grandmother, but Dean actually feels insulted that Sam really thinks he could fool him.

There had been a time when Dean had always known when something was wrong with Sam. He had always smelled his brother's rotten moods, had always picked up on his weird behavior. Sam hadn’t been able to hide that from Dean, not then.

It doesn't feel any different now. Although lifetimes are lying between the two brothers they had been back then and the one's they are now, Dean still feels it, itching under his skin, that something's wrong with his brother.

Getting Sam to share though, Dean doesn't even start counting his chances.

He waits another beat but Sam only looks at him, waiting himself.

"Alright," Dean lets it go for now. It's a tough call and Dean feels terrible for having made that choice but there's nothing he can do about it now.

"So, what are you planning?" Sam asks, obviously relieved to be able to change the topic.

"Cas," Dean simply answers.

Sam looks surprised. "And what... what are you gonna tell them?" he nods to the half open door. "You just want to beam us all out? Tell them 'oh hey guys, meet Cas, he's an angel'?"

"I haven't thought that far, alright?!" Dean answers and he tries to keep his voice down, hoping that the others won't hear them. "I'm sorry that I'm only thinking about getting our asses out of this nightmare, okay?"

Sam makes a face and says nothing, which is the equivalent to 'oh, just do what you want; you'll see it won't work'. It's not better just because he's not voicing it.

Dean huffs angrily but then he lowers his head and concentrates, closing his eyes.

"Castiel, this is Dean, we kinda need your help here. So, would you please come down and ... ." He blinks his eyes open, scanning his surroundings.

Sam has his arms crossed over his chest, looking skeptical. But no sign of the angel.

"Castiel," Dean tries again, with a little more force this time. "If you can hear me, it would be really, really great if you could swing down here for a second."

"Maybe he's busy," Sam offers moments later and Dean has the sudden urge to hit him. Hard. It fades quickly enough though.

"Damnit."

He looks up, catching the eyes of his little brother. "So, what now?" he asks him, but Sam seems distracted all of a sudden, his brother's gaze flickering between him and something behind him.

"Dean?" he asks before Dean can turn around. "Do you ... do you see that?" He nods to something and Dean follows the line of his brother's sight.

Dean closes his eyes for a moment, can't believe how this is getting worse and worse with every passing minute.

"You talking about the damn corpse in the corner? Yes, Sam, I can see it."

In one coordinated move, the brothers walk closer and kneel down, examining the body before them. It's half covered with the dresses hanging from a bar that goes from one wall to the other and Dean shoves them back to get a better view.

It's only bones now, still covered with the remains of clothing, dark pants and a lighter shirt. Dean has seen a few corpses in his life, he knows this one isn't too old. Maybe a few years, a decade at the most.

Still too young to not matter anymore.

 

"Agents?" the Sheriff hesitates at the door, squinting through the gap, and Dean turns around just in time to see the old man's face grow pale as he notices the body.

"Is this ...?" He walks in and his hands are shaking already, his eyes glued to the dead man lying on the ground.

"Sheriff?" Sam asks, comes up from the floor, pushing himself between the body and the old man, blocking his sight.

Dean sees his eyes flicker up to his brother, a mask of pain displayed on his face, and Dean knows instantly who they've just found.

"Richard," Sheriff Atkins wheezes and grips Sam's arm, shoving him away.

"Are you sure?"

But the Sheriff doesn't seem to hear Sam's question which makes it all the more real, all the more terrible.

Dean's stomach turns painfully, just like it always does when this happens. People mourning their dead loved ones.

It's been happening way too often in their lives.

The brothers both take a step back, creating a respectful distance when the Sheriff kneels down to his nephew. They can see his shoulders shake, but the old man doesn't make a sound, suffering in silence.

"I need to cover him up with something," Atkins eventually says, searching the room with his eyes. Dean and Sam watch as he grabs for a blue fabric hanging over a chair next to them.

It's not long enough, the feet are still not covered when the Sheriff drapes it over the dead body, but Dean keeps silent and so does Sam.

They wait until Atkins is done, until the old man turns around with a last trembling breath and catches their eyes.

"We should go;" he says and Dean doesn't argue.

 

\-- + --

 

They've been walking for hours. Testing rooms, leaving some doors open, closing others.

Their watches and phones are dead too; not a terribly surprising, but still scary discovery, but Dean can feel the time pass in his feet and the low rumble in his stomach.

The girls are quiet and so is the Sheriff. There are some shared words once in a while, some whispered encouragements, a few uttered words trying to push each other forward, to keep them going.

Dean and Sam still lead their little group, taking the first steps over the thresholds, and they are the ones who test a room before deciding which way to go.

They still don't have a destination; still don't know where they're going. But it feels different now that they're testing, that they're having a way to choose, a reason to choose.

Dean bites his tongue every time the thought starts making its way to his mouth that they're aimlessly walking around, wandering in circles maybe, or following a path in a never ending maze.

"Just so you know, Sammy, this is your fault," he finally mumbles under his breath, just to say something, to do anything than just goddamn walking.

His brother's head swivels around. "What?"

"You said, and I quote," he explains, even makes the quoty fingers," 'Let's check out the house. Maybe we have something more solid to research on tomorrow'."

Sam only looks at him, baffled and maybe a little angry. "That's what we do, Dean. We check out the crime scenes. That's usually how we know what to look for." His tone is annoyed, Dean can practically hear his eyes rolling in every word and god, he hates it when his brother is right.

"Well, you should have known better," he counters and yes, okay, maybe he's looking for a fight but this house is making him crazy, makes him want to crawl out of his skin.

"If you hadn't been busy nursing your hangover..." Sam quips and now he's pissed off too.

Dean takes an offended breath. "I never get hangovers, Sam. You must mistake me for someone else. Oh let me help you, you!"

They glare at each other, years and years of doing this, of raging each other on and Dean can feel the anger boiling inside him but it feels good, it feels familiar, it feels normal.

Sam turns around and keeps walking, upping his pace and putting a small distance between them. "Well, I was right, wasn't I?" he finally says and Dean would start laughing if his brother wasn't so goddamned right.

"Seriously, Sam," Dean says quietly as soon as he's reaching him again, cursing his brother's long legs inwardly, "we have the mother of all monsters running around free, we have a damn war up in Heaven and yet we get trapped in this stupid goddamn house."

"I know, Dean," Sam hisses and stops and boy, is he angry now. "I know. We have a butt load of bigger problems right now and the world is probably ending for the hundredth time, but we can't do anything about it, can we? I found the hunt, you wanted to take the hunt, so would you please shut up now?"

Dean does. And while he's at it he tries not to look too much like he's pouting.

"Excuse me?" Buffy's voice cuts through the short-lived silence and both brothers turn their heads towards her. "We need to stop. We need to ... we need some rest."

She's standing next to Lauren and Dean only now notices how the girls are holding each other upright, sees how tired their eyes are, how exhausted their faces look.

The Sheriff leans against a huge armchair and doesn't protest against the proposal.

Dean's eyes travel to his brother again, whose eyes are suddenly distant, face scrunched up in concentration.

"Sam?" he asks and it takes a moment until his brother looks up, looks at him.

"Look, Sam," he whispers, getting closer. "If you ... remember anything, if that .... damn wall inside your thick skull is breaking, you gotta tell me, alright? This is so not the place where I need you to get comatose on me, got that?"

His brother actually has the brashness to roll his eyes at him. "Dean, I promise, I'm fine. I'm not remembering, I swear." He even sounds almost convincing.

"So, what do you think?" Dean asks him. "Should we stay here for the night?"

Of course it can't be night anymore, not in their time. But it doesn't matter here, where day and night seem to change with every room.

Dean follows Sam's gaze, sees his brother take in the room they're currently in.

It is a bedroom of some sort, with one small bed in the middle of it and the big armchair. There's nothing else to sleep on, but the floor is covered with a thick ancient rug that looks clean enough. So it will do.

Sam shrugs next to him. "It's as good a place as any."

 

\-- + --

 

"We should have layed the salt-lines," Sam says, but Dean shakes his head, pats the duffel next to him.

"Better chances with our shotguns, Sam."

"Maybe I should stay up, too," Sam whispers, trying to talk low enough that his voice does not carry over to the girls who just curled up together for some sleep. His eyes travel to the Sheriff who took his position to keep watch for the first few hours.

They’re lying next to each other on the floor, but the rug is thick enough that it’s not too uncomfortable.

"Sam, you need to sleep. You look like death warmed over already," Dean answers truthfully and he hates the unsure gaze in his brother's eyes, which he probably thinks he can hide. Sam looks like he's ten again, afraid of all the things that could be hiding in the dark. Dean knows it's not because of this house, not entirely anyway. There's something going on with his brother that he's not yet sharing and it's driving Dean up the wall, but he can't pry, not now, not with civilians so close by.

"Sleep, Sammy," Dean says and it comes out softer than he intended to, but Sam meets his eyes and finally nods, folding out his jacket underneath him and lying down, using his duffel as a pillow. His little brother is facing away from him, his crazily tall frame taking up all the space against the wall.

Dean hears the girls talking in hushed voiced behind him and the Sherriff turning on that worn out chair that makes a sound every time the older man twitches. But his eyes are still on his little brother, that pang of worry rising to the surface again.

Now that he has the time to rest, to think, it becomes clear inside his head.

Something is wrong. Something more than just being trapped in this weird maze of a house.

 

Dean doesn't remember falling asleep and he has no recollection on how long he's been actually sleeping, when a hand roughly shakes his shoulder. "Your turn," the Sheriff says, his voice already worn out and tired.

With his eyes barely open, Dean nods and yawns, trying to blink himself awake enough to get up, although his whole body hurts from the hard floor and he feels more tired than before.

It takes a moment until he realizes that there's another body close to him, warm and familiar and yet completely unusual. Dean turns slowly, careful not to wake Sam with his movements. It's not like he's never woken up with Sam cuddled close to him, but that was twenty years ago and mostly born out of necessity and close quarters.

Sam must have turned during the night, seeking another body's warmth, just like back then when was still afraid of monsters and ghosts and believed his big brother could make it all better.

Dean wishes, every day of his life, that it was still true.

For a second, Dean has the urge to stay. Just scoot a little closer, wrap his little brother in his arms and close his eyes for a moment.

It takes some effort to get up without making too much noise, but when Dean stands, Sam is still sound asleep. His face is changed though and Dean notices it with a punch to his gut. Sam's face had been quiet and peaceful not a minute ago. Now that Dean is standing over him, looking down at his brother curled in on himself, he can see the lines forming on Sam's face, can see the brows furl and the jaw tighten.

The Sheriff clears his throat on the other side of the room, where he just lay down, but when Dean looks up, Atkins is not even looking at him.

Dean still feels caught.

His steps are heavy when he crosses the room to the chair where he takes position. The girls are still asleep, huddled together just like he and Sam have been.

Sam.

Dean's eyes travel back to his brother, to the spot where Sam is lying on the floor. He watches his hand twitch, like he's grabbing for something, trying to hold onto someone.

He prays Sam is not dreaming of Hell, hopes he's not remembering all the terrible stuff he's seen. His little brother doesn't get enough sleep as it is, nightmares still keeping him up just like it had been right after Jess. And Sam needs his sleep, needs the strength it's giving him, however bad the sleep might be.

Dean's not gonna wake Sam up for his turn of the watch. It's not even a decision he's making; it had been clear as soon as they went to sleep.

Dean sighs and rubs his mouth. He's scared, inside, deeply scared for Sam. There is a bomb ticking inside his little brother, a wall, already crumbling and it's ready to burst with the next hit.

Dean doesn't know what he will do when it comes to that.


	4. chapter b

_Sioux Falls, South Dakota_

 

Bobby busied himself with being useful; he figured Sam could use something to eat, could use something to get some strength back into him. And maybe it would chase off the haunted look from his face.

There wasn't really much he could make of some old cans containing pea soup, spaghetti and chicken noodle soup, along with the leftover chicken wings he had from the day before. Surely, some fresh bread and hell, some fruits, would be better to get those boys up and running again. But if they came to Bobby for help and shelter, they had to deal with what Bobby could offer.

The chicken noodle soup heated up fast and soon Bobby had set up what could pass as a proper meal on the table, hot and steaming and that counted for a lot in Bobby's book.

"Sam?" Bobby shouted up the stairs. He didn't bother staying quiet; Dean was out cold and would be for a little while by the looks of it. He didn't hear any sounds from upstairs, he hoped Sam didn't just fall asleep right there, somewhere on the floor. "Sam?"

Another beat of silence and then Bobby heard the familiar sound of long legs stumbling down the stairs, and wasn't that just sad? That Bobby was more used to hear either of them make their way down slowly, or wounded, or so out of it that he would expect hearing them fall down more than anything else?

"Bobby?" came the quiet voice from behind him.

"Eat." Bobby gestured vaguely to the table where the food was waiting, he didn't look too closely at the young man because he was still flinching, his instinct still kicking in and calling Sam an enemy.

Bobby wondered when that would finally stop.

"You ... cooked," Sam mumbled, his brows furrowed, his eyes glued to the bowl with the soup and the plate with the chicken wings. He looked as if the basic concept of food was completely unfamiliar to him.

"You should eat something, Sam." Bobby had his back turned to the young man, cleaning the pot under the faucet.

"I'm not hungry," Sam said behind him, low, almost a whisper and Bobby turned around.

"Sit down and eat, son," Bobby used his father-voice, hoping to get through to Sam. "You look like a ghost and your brother needs you. You won't do him or yourself any good starving."

Sam seemed to think about that. He wore his wounded-puppy-face, with a look so distant in his eyes that it sent a chill through Bobby's bones. It was just that bit too close to that empty, soulless version of Sam that Bobby still remembered too vividly.

Eventually, Sam nodded. "Alright."

 

Bobby watched him pick at his food, glancing from under his cap to the young man sitting in the middle of his kitchen, looking like he didn't even know where he was.

"You gonna tell me what happened?" Bobby asked, trying to make it sound casual, although he was dying to know what had brought Dean into the bed upstairs, more dead than alive, with Sam looking like he had lost more than his soul this time.

But Sam didn't react at first. He jerked around after Bobby called his name three times, his eyes traveling to the kitchen door, nervous and restless. Bobby had the faint idea, that it was Dean who didn't allow Sam's mind to rest.

"Sam?"

"I ...," Sam stopped and after a second it seemed to Bobby as if he simply forgot that he wanted to say something in the first place.

Sam's eyes traveled back to the door, his whole body language barely letting him stay put.

Bobby sighed, rubbing his eyes slowly.

"Go back to your brother, Sam," he said roughly. "I'll bring the food upstairs."

When Sam looked up, Bobby caught his eyes for a moment, and he saw sadness and relief equally measured in there, before Sam turned around without another word and left the room like it was on fire.

As if the outside world would vanish, if Sam didn't get there fast enough.


	5. chapter b - part one

_Shepherdstown, West Virginia_

 

Sam panics the moment he wakes up. The solid, strong, living weight next to him is gone, Dean is gone, Dean is ...

Sam gulps for air when he sees Dean on the other side of the room, looking at him, already alarmed, half sitting, half standing, ready to run to his brother and for a second Sam wants that, wants Dean to run over and touch him, hold him, chase the nightmares away that are clinging to him like spiderwebs.

But that feeling is gone, thankfully, a second later and Sam feels like a human again, like a grown-up who doesn't need his brother like he needs air.

There's a shiver running down his spine reminding him that sometimes, Dean seems even more important than that.

Sam gets up slowly, cracks his bones and hates how his body aches, like he's old and wrong and not good enough. It's a fleeting thought but not a new one and it's gone as soon as Sam's standing and meeting his brother's eyes over the room.

Dean asks a question with the tilt of his head, and Sam answers just as quick and silent, with a short nod. 'Yes, I'm okay.' Although it's a lie and they probably both know it.

The song plays in the background.

"We're ready," Lauren announces from the side; she and Buffy look terrible, afraid and tired, but there's strength coming off of them, determination, and Sam draws a little from that strength too.

"Alright then."

He watches Dean glance at the Sheriff, watches him search for any hints that could mean a delay. But when he doesn't seem to find anything, he nods again and turns to the door next to the big dresser. The one they hadn't opened last night.

Sam is still surprised when the room behind that door is nothing else but an innocent bathroom. Small and dirty and old, with pale blue tiles, a huge crack in the sink and a destroyed toilet bowl, but still completely normal looking.

It changes, of course, the moment Dean closes the door.

 

\-- + --

 

"What the ..." Sam hears his brother whisper and the group stops in it's tracks.

"It looks like a ...," Buffy starts and Sam watches her take in the room they're standing in now with huge eyes and an open mouth.

"It looks like a pub," the Sheriff finishes for her, his dark voice rumbling through the room.

And he is right.

The five of them are standing in the middle of an old restaurant; booths and tables around them, a bar in front of them, with a shelf still stocked with glasses and bottles behind it.

But that's not all Sam sees.

There's a body in one of the booths. It's head on the table, with an ugly looking wound splitting down behind one ear and going all the way down to the neck, it's face hidden from view.

Sam still knows who it is instantly. Knows it by the familiar frame, the short hair, every single detail that is screaming 'Dean! Dean! It's Dean!'.

And if the real one wasn't standing next to him, his eyes traveling through the room, not once stopping in the corner that is making Sam's heart beat faster and bile rise in his throat; Sam would lose it right here.

But he knows by now that he's the only one to see this, finding Dean dead, or barely alive in every other room, and that it's not real. He knows his brother is alive and breathing right next to him although it gets harder every minute to believe it.

He's pretty sure he knows the reason too, why he's the only one. Knows that among their little group, he's the one who's wired wrong, the one who's been ... different all his life. So there hadn't been a hint of surprise when Sam had realized that when everyone else kept seeing empty rooms piled with dust, he kept seeing ... this.

Just as he's the only one hearing the song playing in the backround, sometimes louder, sometimes barely there, but constantly scratching in the back of his mind, scrubbing it raw.

"This is pretty neat," his brother says from behind the bar when he spots the whiskey on the shelves and Sam searches his eyes, breathes for a moment when he sees the glee in there, the life.

And of course only Dean could look like a little kid in a candy shop in a situation like this.

"Is that real whiskey?" Buffy asks, following Dean to the rack.

Sam sees his brother smell the bottle and shrug, the grin still firmly on his face.

"Time for breakfast, everyone!" his brother announces and places the bottle on the bar with a loud clonk.

Sam doesn't move at first. He watches Buffy and Lauren sit down in front of Dean, watches the Sheriff settle next to his brother, but although his eyes are glued to Dean, glued to the living, breathing Dean, the presence of the dead one and the smell of rotting flesh, still tingling Sam's neck.

"Sam?" Dean asks a moment, or minutes, later and his tone is changed now, the glee is gone and the big-brother-concern is in full swing. "You gotta eat something, dude."

"Yeah. Yeah, okay," Sam nods and only now realizes that he's still standing in the middle of the room, doing nothing but staring at his brother. He walks awkwardly over to the rest of the group and sits down next to Sheriff Atkins, his bones cracking as he bends his knees to take his seat.

"Here." Dean presents him with half a chocolate bar he knows Dean usually keeps in his own duffel, and a shot of whiskey. Their eyes meet briefly when Sam grabs for the glass and his hand touches his brother's.

It's a silent communication: Dean telling him that there is still water in his duffel, Sam nodding subtlely that he has some left, too, and both agreeing that they have to keep it a little while longer, in case things get worse.

And things always get worse.

"So," Atkins croaks, clearing his throat then goes on,"you guys are not really Feds, are you?"

Sam and Dean share another short glance.

"Nope," Dean states, pouring himself a glass of whiskey and at first glance he looks like just another bartender in an old bar, serving drinks and talking to the customers. Sam tries to savor that image a little while longer, watching his brother's hands putting away the bottle, watches him take a sip. Watches his tongue chase the moisture on his lips.

The dead, unseen, unreal body behind him, burns like a fire in Sam's neck.

"We're hunters," Dean explains further.

"Like deer?" Buffy pushes her long hair out of her face, her pale white hands gripping the whiskey glass tight enough that Sam is afraid it'll burst.

"We hunt monsters. Ghosts, women in white, all the things you hear about in fairytales and nightmares."

Sam takes a bite from his chocolate bar as he listens to his brother. The speech hasn't changed over the years. Dean's still telling it like they were still cruising the backroads of America, killing some harmless, forgotten monsters on the way.

It's ridiculous how ... innocent that sounds. Compared to what they've been through in the last years. Compared to Lucifer, Hell, the Apocalypse.

Sam drinks the whiskey that doesn't even taste half bad and chews on his food while the discussion next to him takes the familiar turn to disbelief and slowly dawning to understanding.

It's not as crazy as it would be hearing about it in your own home, sitting on your couch while the sun is shining and kids are playing outside. It's doesn't sound crazy at all when you're trapped in a house that keeps changing every time you close a door.

So their reactions are tame, welcoming even.

It helps that Dean can ooze out confidence when he wants to. Just like Sam can bring any victim to talk. Dean only needs to hold himself just right, lower his voice a notch and turn on a serious face and even a dying man would trust him that everything was going to be okay.

When Sam is honest with himself, he knows it's still working on him, too.

The conversation slowly subsides.

Lauren and Buffy first kept asking questions, eager and curious, but with every word, every next truth, their hunger for it died pretty quick.

But they keep on talking with low voices, small talk, just like they were meeting here in this bar by chance, having a few drinks with some strangers.

Sam feels his brother's eyes on him the entire time.

He doesn't think the others can see it, that they catch the glance Dean is shooting him every now and then.

Dean knows something is up, of course he does, but Sam can't tell him, doesn't even know ... doesn't even know where to begin. There is something stopping him, something Sam can't explain. But he doesn't want Dean to know. Doesn't want to add on more thing on the pile of crazy Sam is.

The song keeps ringing in his ears and Sam downs the shot.

"Alright, guys," Dean announces to the room. "We should get going."

Sam knows that they're leaving because of him.

He's the one at a breaking point now.

 

\-- + --

 

"Okay, which one are we gonna take?" Buffy looks up to Sam, then Dean, indicating the two other doors in this room. They both look alike, brown old doors with weird doorknobs. One is big and silver, the other one white, looking like it's made of ceramic. Neither really fits with the rest of the room.

"Let's test both," Dean decides and Sam watches his brother go for the first one.

 

"Not this one," Dean announces when he gets back from it, holding a hand over his mouth and his face looking pale.

His eyes meet Sam's, and Sam nods, ushering the others to the second door, not giving them the chance to ask what Dean had seen. Sam knows the look on his brother's face good enough not to ask himself.

The second is unsuspicious enough.

They follow a few rooms that all look much the same. They're empty, for the most part, with a thick carpet covering most of the floor and green tapestry on the walls. They only ever vary in shape and sizes. One room is almost not big enough to hold them all. One is so huge they can't see the end from where they enter.

The rooms always only have two doors.

And the music gets louder.

Sam tries to ignore the images he's tormented with, the bodies he's seeing on the floor, on the wall, on the ceiling.

Dean, dead. Dean, bloody. Dean, ripped apart.

Dean, dying.

And if he walks a little too close to his brother, Dean doesn't say anything, and for that, Sam's grateful.

They finally come to a room with three doors. They all look pretty much the same, only small details are different. Two of the doors are plain white, both with frosted glass windows and the third one is coated dark brown.

They try the two white one's first.

"No change," Sam tells the others the second time, both doors leading to similar bedrooms that didn't change when he had closed the door.

"I'll try the brown," Dean announces next and Sam nods, walks over to his brother to close the door behind him.

"Five, six, seven." Sam counts silently under his breath, ignoring the song playing in the background, growing louder every minute Dean does this. "Eight, Nine, Ten."

Sam rips open the door, everytime. He can't do it calmly, can't wait another heartbeat once the time is up, too afraid he could open the door and Dean wouldn't be there anymore.

"Guys," Dean says, alert, from the other side of the door. "You gotta see this."

They don't hesitate to follow Dean into room. Sam is the last one, closing the door again, this time behind him.

The room, once plain with only a hardwood floor and nothing else, changes.

It almost looks the same, the floor isn't different, there's still no window, but there's a fireplace on one wall, an open door right next to it and an old armchair, standing right in the middle.

There's a boy sitting in the chair.

Alive.

 

\-- + --

 

"Troy!" Lauren all but screams and sprints forward, jumping into her brother's arms. Buffy's right on her heels.

Sam glances to his own brother, sees the relief right there on Dean's face, the hint of pride in his eyes that they did this. That they found him.

"Sheriff," Troy nods to Atkins as soon as he's released from the tight embrace. He is pale, looks exhausted and tired and he's holding himself weirdly, as if he's hurt somewhere.

But other than that he looks as fine as one can be given the situation. Being trapped in a house for days.

"This is my brother, Sam," Dean introduces him and Troy's eyes fly to Sam, nodding.

"You came to find me?" he asks and suddenly the boy sounds even younger than he is, and Sam knows that Dean is going to do everything in his power to get this kid out.

"Thank you," Lauren whispers against the tears in her throat and she smiles at them for the first time since they met in here.

Dean nods grimly and Sam watches his brother, knows what he's thinking.

They're not out yet. They're not saved yet.

 

Troy starts coughing all of sudden, heavy and violently and the brothers rush forward.

"Sam, get me the water," Dean orders and Sam's hand is already reaching inside his duffel, searching for the small bottle, when Troy shakes his head.

"I don't need ... thanks guys, but I have ... there's enough water," he mumbles, rushing through the words as if he isn't used to speaking anymore. "There." The boy points with his finger and Sam and Dean turn around, find him pointing at the wide open door to another room.

A bathroom.

"It's ... it's working."

They all stare silently for a moment until Buffy breaks out a heartfelt "oh, thank god," and goes for the room.

"Don't close the door!" Dean and Sam warn almost simultaneously, earning an outraged look from both of the girls. But then Buffy seems to catch the serious look in both their eyes and she nods, her face suddenly pale. "Okay."

"You can," Troy says and he tries to get up from the chair, moves carefully until he flinches.

Sam is by his side and stops him with a hand to his shoulder. "Easy, buddy," he tells him, pushing the boy gently back into his chair.

"You can," Troy repeats, still looking at Buffy.

"Look, there's ...," he points to the bathroom door. "Look at the doorknob."

Sam does. He turns around and notices the simple doorknob, wooden and small, with a little symbol - a flower - engraved in it.

"It's the same symbol here," Troy goes on and points the armrest of the chair.

He's right. The same symbol is hidden under layers of dust, scratches, and peeling paint but it's doubtlessly there.

"What are you saying?" Dean asks and looks as confused as Sam feels.

"Look at the other one." Troy twists awkwardly in his chair, pointing to the other door in this room and that one has a doorhandle, plain and simple like the other one, but made of metal instead of wood.

"The bathroom door belongs to the room, while the other one doesn't." Troy looks from face to face, waiting for a reaction.

"So, the bathroom won't change...," Sam starts.

"But the room behind that door," Dean points to the other one and finishes Sam's sentence,"will change as soon as we close it."

Troy simply nods.

"Wow." Dean blinks and he looks kind of goofy doing that, but Sam is too busy processing what he's just learned than to concentrate on the flutter his stomach makes when he looks at his brother.

They all seem to need that kind of moment and Sam can feel the faint rush in his blood, the excitement.

They're one step closer to figuring out this puzzle.

 

Troy moves again and hisses, Sam not fast enough to stop him.

"Are you hurt?" he asks the boy and pushes him gently back into the chair a second time.

Troy nods. "My ankle. I twisted it, or broke it, when I ran."

"Let me," Lauren says even before Sam has time to think about the options they have, about what to do to help Troy. "I am a nurse." She kneels down in front of her brother and reaches for the bag she's been carrying around with her.

Her moves are quick and efficient. Sam watches her push up the trouser leg to take a closer look, feeling and proding the ugly purple ankle.

"We need something to stabilize him," she announces, sounding surer now, professional and Sam envies her for having the chance to focus on something like that.

"What about this?" Sam reaches for the old iron picker that is hanging off a nail by the fireplace.

Lauren thanks him, taking it, and Sam steps back, letting her work.

"Think this'll work?" Dean whispers next to him and Sam startles, his brother's breath hitting his ear.

"It has to," is Sam's quiet answer. He turns his head to his brother, meets Dean's eyes.

His brother nods. "Okay. We should all take the chance and use that bathroom and I'm gonna fill up on as much water as we can. Then we'll have to keep going."

 

\-- + --

 

"You sure it'll work?" Dean asks Troy for the hundredths time but Troy still nods patiently, although Sam can see how he's clenching his jaw, trying to handle the pain.

Sheriff Atkins has one arm around the boy's back, Troy leaning against him. They look wobbly and struggling, but Troy is almost standing and that's the only way they can walk.

And they have no choice but to walk.

Dean takes a last checking glance and then nods, gesturing the whole group to move on.

Sam walks last. He takes a deep breath, before he follows the rest, mentally hardening himself.

It's gonna be a long day.

 

\-- + --

 

The doorknob is cold to Sam's touch, icy cold and Sam flinches back. It's the only door they have, the only option they have, beside trying to go back a few rooms and taking another direction.

There's a smell in the air, faint like the song, and it smells of fire and ash and coal. He ignores it, just like the rest.

"Sam?" Dean asks behind him, clearly waiting for Sam to open the door.

Sam does.

The smell of fire gets more distinct and Sam turns to the others but they just keep looking at him expectantly, so he keeps silent.

The room in front of him is beautiful. He hears Buffy gasp as they walk in, looking around with wide eyes. It's a winter garden. It's a huge room with three large windows in the front. The curtains are pulled close so they can't see what's outside this time but the inside is taking all their attention.

"What is this?" Lauren asks, touching the huge plant next to her that looks more like a tree and reaches up to the ceiling. The room is full of them. There are larger plants and huge flower pots filled with flowers of all forms and sizes. They're in full blossom, rich in colors, perfectly healthy.

"We should test this room," Sam insists, his eyes finding his brother's. The smell of fire is so intense now that he can taste the ash on his tongue.

"Somethin' wrong?" Dean asks him, coming closer.

"I don't know, but ..."

He watches the Sheriff bringing Troy in, the boy holding on to the older man and hobbling over to a garden bench right in front of an arrangement of roses and tulips. The Sheriff sets him down carefully and looks around himself.

"Well, that's definitely a change," his rough voice carries through the room.

"There are no doors," Buffy announces from somewhere Sam can't see and Sam's heart sinks. So they have to close the door, hoping, that the room this one will turn into, has another one. If it changes at all.

Sam is pretty sure it will, although the door doesn't indicate anything.

"I'll do it," Dean says, obviously having reached the same conclusion.

Sam nods. The girls are back now with Troy, the Sheriff next to them, so they're ready.

"Here we go," Dean announces and closes the door.

As soon as Sam hears the click, a little girl appears in front of his eyes. Her hair is on fire. She screams at the top of her lungs.

And she's running right at him.

 

\-- + --

 

"Sam!" he hears Dean call his name and Sam raises his arms on instinct, tries to jump back and cover himself at the same time and he lands hard on the floor.

There's a loud slam and only a moment later Sam realizes that Dean has pushed the door shut again, the room switching back, although Sam can't remember anything but the burning girl from the other room.

He pants heavily, staring ahead, ready to fight, but there are only the plants in front him.

And they look different now.

The plants are dead. All of them brown and thin and hanging low, leaves covering the floor, rotten or dried out. The curtains are ripped to shreds, stained and moldering, and Sam can see outside now. It's dark and there's a storm raging, the rain hitting the glass like bullets.

And in the middle of the room, there's an inverted cross, it's wood thick like tree trunks.

His brother is hanging from it, head down, bloody and torn open, his eyes dead.

"Oh god, oh god," Sam pants, trying to get up but doesn't get his legs to move. "Dean!" he shouts and the name is ripping open old wounds that never fully healed and it hurts so damn much to see what he's been dreaming of for so long.

"Sam!" a choir of voices shouts but his eyes are glued to his dead brother, and his mind isn't able to get any further than that.

He hears a scream, high and inhuman, and then he's hit from the side, pushed and dragged, and a second later he sees that it's Dean, the real Dean, his brother, alive and solid and fucking angry.

And across the room, there's the little girl again.

"Wake up, Sam!" Dean shouts at him, shaking him by his collar. "Come on!"

For one precious moment, Sam can only stare at him.

"Sam, damnit!"

Sam sees the slap coming but doesn't react. Not at first. It takes his brother a second one and the other's to shout once again before he wakes up from his shock and finally, finally moves.

Dean heaves him up, pulling him with him, just when the girl appears in front of them, closer now, her face frozen in a never ending scream.

"Run!" Sam hears his brother scream and from the corner of his eyes he sees the girls staring in horror and the Sheriff trying to pull Troy up. He searches frantically for his duffel, knows that the shotgun is in there, but he spots it too far away, lost in the fall and Sam can't reach it in time. And he doesn't see Dean's either.

What he sees, is the little girl walking towards him, flickering like a bad TV screen and her hair is burning, illuminating her face like a halo, and the heat is growing, biting at his skin.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," Dean curses while he's trying to escape, trying to run backwards to his own duffel. He's throwing things at the ghost, flower pots and little stools and it does nothing to stop her.

Going for Sam.

She reaches him, finally, as if it wasn't senseless to run from a ghost to begin with, and her fire prickles on his skin, burning it already.

"Sam!" Dean shouts and Sam can see his brother fumbling for his gun.

"Come on, come on," Sam prays under his breath, and he has nowhere to go now, trapped against a wall, and he can hear Lauren and Buffy scream, their voices mixing with the little girl's.

Until something is hitting him from the side the same second Dean is firing the shotgun.

It's dead quiet after that.

Sam looks down upon himself, checking for injuries he might not feel yet, but he's okay, he's alive and unharmed.

Dean is standing next to his duffel, the shotgun still raised.

The Sheriff and the girls are staring at them, white as sheets.

It's Troy who surprises him, kneeling down in the middle of the room.

Sam looks down to his feet.

"Nails?" he asks and turns his head to Troy who's still panting and swallowing heavily. But the boy nods.

"I found them in one of the rooms," he explains. "She ... she goes away when I throw them at her."

"Iron," Sam and Dean conclude in unison.

"Smart move," Dean says as he gets up. "Is everyone alright?"

Buffy and Lauren nod but they're shaking like leaves. Sheriff Atkins doesn't even answer.

 

"A word, Sam?" his brother says through clenched teeth, and Sam can see that he's vibrating with anger, sees the tension in his shoulders and his jaw. Sam gulps and nods. He's still shaken up, his mind spinning from what he's seen and it's not the ghost of a little girl that's giving him trouble.

He follows Dean though, knows it's the smartest thing to do right now.

They walk around the corner, barely out of sight and earshot, and suddenly Sam is attacked by his brother, pushed against a wall and held in place by his brother's hand on his chest.

"What the hell was that, Sammy?" he asks and Dean is beyond pissed right now. "You don't get to pull this shit now, understand? If you remember anything from Hell..."

"Dean." Sam stops him, and he can't hear it anymore, can't take his brother's words anymore because it's not about that, never has been, not once since he set foot in this building and Dean. doesn't. understand.

"You could've died there, Sam," Dean explains carefully, saying it like he's talking to a little kid. "You've gotta tell me what's wrong with you. Please."

But Sam's tongue is tied in his mouth. His breath burns his chest and he's lost again. Lost in the sight of Dean. Alive.

And god, he's going to snap soon. Something inside him will just break, maybe The Wall will break and Dean can be right after all.

"Sam," Dean hisses, taking a step closer, and his brother's hand feels like fire on Sam's chest, but he can't shake him off, can't push back because...

Because.

Because it's Dean and he's close and he's warm, and he's breathing and Sam...

Sam suddenly only wants to pull him even closer, wants to breathe him right in.

With a sudden jolt Sam realizes that his fingers ache to touch.

His lips ache to taste.

Sam lets out a ragged breath, his stomach churning and his heart galloping, and Dean must see something on Sam's face or maybe he can just feel it, because he suddenly jumps back, let's go of Sam as if he's been burned.

They stare at each other for a long, trembling moment and Sam can feel something shift between them, hell, can feel the world tilt on it's axis. But then it's over and gone and Dean breaks their eye contact and takes another step back.

"We should go back," Dean says and god, he sounds wrecked, sounds off balance and Sam didn't know that he could still do that to his big brother.


	6. chapter b - part two

They find the others waiting right where they left them.

"What do you know about the little girl?" Dean asks Troy immediately, and the boy flinches, leaning away.

"What do you ...?"

"Dean," Sam says quietly but his brother has heard him anyway and Sam sees him take a deep breath before he goes on.

"You threw nails at her," Dean says, much gentler than before. "How did you know? Have you seen her before? Do you know anything about her?"

"She's ... she's." Troy gulps. "Her name is ... or was, Amy Entler."

"So, another ghost? Really?" Buffy asks and she shounds half disbelieving and half horrified. Sam only nods.

"Where do you know her from?"

"I wrote a report in Local History a few weeks ago," Troy explains to Dean. "It was about Rumsey Hall. She was part of it."

"What happened to her?" Sam asks.

"She died in a fire when she was four. She was playing with matches."

The fire.

Sam shivered at the thought of it. But that explained the smell. And the ghost.

"So if she ... appears again," Lauren starts, her voice faltering," we have to throw nails at her, to make her go away?"

Dean nods. "That or anything made of iron that you can find. It doesn't kill them, but it scares them off. Also," Dean makes sure he has everyone's attention. "Salt. Ghosts can't cross that. Sam's and my shotguns are filled with rocksalt cartdridges. It's enough to buy some time."

"What does kill her?" The Sheriff asks and he hasn't spoken in a long time, his voice sounding rougher than before.

"We'd have to burn her remains."

There's a shocked silence after Sam's answers, the others slowly realizing what he's talking about here.

"Yeah," Dean breaks it. "Therefore we'd have to find these. And we can only do that if we're finding a way out. So you all have to keep your eyes open, alright?"

It's a silly picture, how the girls, Troy and the Sheriff all nod. It reminds Sam of school or of boyscouts following their leader and he feels laughter bubbling up his throat.

Sam takes a deep breath. He's starting to get hysteric.

"Okay. What about the man with the gun?" Dean goes on, asking Troy. "Have you seen him?"

Troy frowns, shakes his head. "I haven't seen another one."

 

\-- + --

 

"What do we do now?" Buffy asks, her arms crossed over her chest. Her voice is thin, the last minutes clearly showing their toll on her. "There is no other door out of this room. Does it mean we have to go back?"

"Fuck," Dean curses under his breath.

"Yeah, we have to," his brother replies for everyone this time and there's an uneasy feeling creeping up his spine. He knows what's making Dean look like this, tensed and annoyed.

They have to go back and take another door.

They have to take the door Dean didn't want to talk about what he had found behind it.

 

\-- + --

 

"Don't look too close, cover your noses and follow right behind me," Dean orders, hand still on the door.

Sam feels his stomach turn at what is about to come and he can see Lauren shiver.

Dean doesn't give them more time to prepare.

It's a loud sound when the door falls shut, an echo bouncing through the now long and wide room.

"Oh God," Lauren breathes and covers her mouth. Buffy hisses and coughs, barely withholding the urge to puke.

"Holy shit." The Sheriff gets a tighter grip on Troy and turns them, turns their back to the room as if that could help the boy. As if that could make him unsee.

"Let's keep walking," Dean says and it's in that brisk, hard tone of his that nobody dares to disobey.

Sam takes a deep breath and regrets it immediately.

The smell of blood and vomit lays heavy in the air. It's reeking of urine and intestines and above all that of mould and death. Sam's eyes start to water but he fights it, taking step after step at the end of their little group.

They're making slow progress.

The room is makeshift field hospital, large because it looks like three rooms where they broke off the walls to combine them, and it's stuffed to the brim with thin cots. They're no people left but Sam can still see the stains of blood and things he doesn't want to imagine on the beds and the floor.

And the smell doesn't go away.

"Half way," Dean announces and Sam can barely see him behind the others, can only hear him and that's enough to make him nervous.

Because there's a person lying in one of the beds, a body covered with a sheet. It's at the other end of the room but Sam can still see it from here, can see the fresh blood blossoming on the person's chest.

He closes his eyes and wills his nerves to calm down.

He shouldn't be this affected anymore, shouldn't be so easily hit when he knows, fucking knows, that his brother is alive and well not even ten feet from him.

"Oh my god," Buffy sobs and Sam looks now, his eyes flying to the body first although it can't be what Buffy saw because nobody sees it. Nobody sees it but him.

"Don't look, kid," Atkins pulls them further, keeps walking stoicly and pulling Troy with him. Sam is right behind.

"It's a hallucination," he hears his brother say and then his eyes find what the other see, they fall on the small wooden crib standing by one of the beds.

Covered in dried blood.

"No. It's history," Lauren mumbles and Sam glances to her, watches her eyes firmly trained to the floor and her face pale.

Sam shudders when he realizes that she is right.

And then he makes the mistake and turns around, looking back.

"Oh, God."

He stops in his tracks, can't walk another step and he's certain his knees are going to give out under him any second.

The cots are no longer empty.

There's a body in every single one of them, some covered, some not. Some faces stare at him in horror, some with empty gazes.

Dean.

There's Dean in every single bed behind him.

Sam's throat is closing up and he has trouble breathing, the stale polluted air clogging his lungs. He knows it's not real, but that doesn't help him, that doesn't change the fact that all of it happened.

That every dead Dean in this room really died. And he was the one that couldn't stop it.

Sam wonders if this was what Hell looked like to him.

"Sam!" There's a sharp noise in his ear and then a hand gripping his shoulder and pulling him around.

Dean doesn't say anything, only glares but there's no heat in his eyes. Nothing but concern and confusion and Sam doesn't even notice how he's gripping his brother's hand and holds on.

The bang of a door being slammed shut jerks them around.

"Run, Sam, run."

Dean doesn't hesitate when they both see him, the ghost or whatever he is, standing by the door they just came from.

"RUN!" Dean shouts at the others and helps the Sheriff propping up Troy, both men practically carrying him towards the door on the other side.

The girls are first, running for their lives and Sam follows right after, not wasting anymore time looking left and right, not counting his failures with every cot he passes by.

The footsteps echo loudly behind them. A slow, steady rhythm.

And then the first shot falls.

"Fuck!" Dean curses and Sam ducks instinctively as the bullet bounces off the wall.

"Open the door!" Dean barks the order at the girls and they don't falter, pulling the heavy doors right open and Dean and the Sheriff slide right through it, Troy dangling between them.

"Sammy, come on!" Dean grips his arm as soon as he's close enough and pulls him through the door.

Together, they close it just in time when the next bullet hits.

And the room changes.

 

\-- + --

 

They both let go of the doorknobs as soon as the room seems relatively safe. The doors vanish immediately behind them, a dull echo from bullets hitting a wall still coming through.

"I can't do this," Buffy whimpers from the floor. "I can't do this, I can't ..." She buries her head in her hands and Sam can see her whole body shake. Lauren walks up to her, pulling her into a hug, but nobody says anything.

There's nothing to say.

"Let's take a break," Dean commands, his voice low and quiet, and he helps Troy up on a chair. That's when Sam shakes his head to get a grip on himself and looks at the room.

It's a study.

It's not really big, only two closets, a sofa, a desk and a chair are fitting in it, but it looks actually quite nice, all clean and well kept.

Troy is sitting on the chair, the girls moved from the floor to the sofa and the Sheriff just stands by the only window, looking out.

It's a bright, sunny day outside and Sam can see an empty street, stables, and a huge backyard.

It's the first time that outside looks almost like it should be.

"Sam," his brother's calm voice cuts through the heavy silence. Dean is standing by the desk, holding a framed picture in his hand.

"What is it?" Sam walking to his brother, looks over his shoulder, but for a moment he can't see anything. After everything that happened in the room they just left, his brother is now so close, his warmth is seeping right into Sam's skin.

Sam needs to physically stop himself to not breathe his brother in, suppressing a shudder and pulling away.

"That guy reminds you of someone?" Dean asks and Sam remembers that he was supposed to look at something.

It's a photograph, old and sepia colored, the borders already folding and darkening. It shows three men in black suits, standing next to each other, but not very close, all looking into the camera. He recognizes two of them from the pictures they found in the first storage room - the brothers.

And then he recognizes the third man.

"It's the ghost," Sam gasps and there's no doubt. It's the same dark, serious face, the same angry eyes, even the same damn clothes he's wearing.

Dean flips the fram and opens it to get the photo out.

"Daniel and Joseph Entler," he reads the tiny writing on the back," Thomas James. 1823."

"So they knew each other," Sam muses, his thoughts running. "Wait, wasn't ... Daniel Entler was the owner of this building once, right?"

Dean only looks puzzled.

Sam huffs a breath. "It's what Bobby told us, I think. Daniel Entler was the owner of the Entler Hotel and his brother owned another ... restaurant or shop or hotel in the city."

Dean seems to remember. Sam watches his brother frown, then nod. "Yeah, but what about this Thomas guy? Did Bobby mention something about him?"

Sam doesn't recall anything. The phonecall to Bobby had been short, they hadn't spoken much more beyond the Entler brothers.

"Well," Dean starts and there's a ghost of a smirk on his lips," let's ask our very own local guide."

"Troy?" His brother rests against the desk, Sam following behind to hear their conversation. "What do you know about a Thomas James?"

Troy seems to think, tilts his head and for a second he reminds Sam of Castiel and Sam vaguely wonders again why their angel didn't show up.

"He was...," Troy says, "he was the owner of the pub. Globe Tavern, I think."

Sam and Dean share a look.

"Yeah, we came through it on our way here."

"You've seen it?" Troy seems surprised.

"You didn't?" Now it's Sam's turn to be taken aback.

There is a moment of silence, the fact sinking in.

"Holy shit," Dean states and looks at Sam. "You know what that means?"

Sam nods, feels horror gripping his insides. "The rooms are not linear. Every room can lead to every other. Damnit."

It feels a lot like a step back.

 

\-- + --

 

Sam takes the next turn in carrying Troy. The boy is tall, at least tall enough that walking with him isn't as hard as Sam feared it to be.

He shoulders his bag before he gets a good grip on the boy, a small stack of letters neatly stowed away in the last second. Sam had discovered it in the small deskdrawer and put away to look at it later, when the other's already were waiting impatiently for them.

The first room they enter is another long corridor. It's narrow and the walls are covered with empty picture frames, hundreds and hundreds of them in all sizes, only showing the bleached tapestry on the wall.

It's dark too.

There seems to be a small light at the end of it, but around them it's pitch dark.

At first.

Buffy is the one trying her flashlight first. It's not completely dead like before, a faint glow coming from it. Lauren tries hers after and her flashlight has almost the same shine.

They're lucky. All of their flashlights are functioning again, barely, but it's enough to keep on walking.

 

"You okay?" Sam asks as he catches Troy flinch all of a sudden, halfway down the hallway. He can't hide it, not when he's leaning against Sam with every step.

He watches the boy closing his eyes and shaking his head, watches him shake something off, before he's looking at Sam again.

"It's nothing," Troy says and it's a flat out lie.

Sam walks even closer, making sure the others can't hear them.

"Are you ... are you seeing things? Things that are not there, that only you can see?"

Troy looks up and Sam knows immediately that he hit the bull's eye.

"Because it's been happening to me, too."

Sam doesn't need to look at the boy. He feels the boy's eyes burn a hole in the side of his head.

"You ... mean that?" he asks tentatively.

Sam meets the boy's stare. "It's your sister, right? Bad stuff happening to her?"

Troy pales visibly in front of him.

"I see her ... I see her die. Or dead, sometimes," he confesses silently.

Sam shouldn't be as relieved as he is, shouldn't be happy that he's not the only one going through this. Although deep down, he suspects that he has it a lot worse.

"I'm sorry," he tells Troy when the images of his own brother hit him. He glances over to Dean, who's talking to Lauren, and he sees Troy doing the same.

"Do you ... do you know what it means?" Troy whispers and Sam wishes he did, wishes he could make sense of the house. He shakes his head, keeping his eyes on his brother -

the real one, breathing and talking and walking right across from him.

Not the one lying dead on the floor, ten feet behind them.

"I wish I did," Sam whispers to himself.

 

\-- + --

 

Dean walks over to him when the Sheriff takes over again and carefully pulls Troy along with him.

"The kid okay?" Dean asks low under his breath.

Sam nods, trying not to meet Dean's eyes because he's afraid now, afraid that he will find them looking at him and never be able to turn away.

"We have to stop for the night soon," Sam says instead, looking at the rest of their little group. They all look tired, look exhausted pretty much all the time, but Sam can see the difference, he can see the darker circles under the girl's eyes and the rougher look around the Sheriff's mouth.

He glances to his brother eventually, he can't help himself, and he sees Dean clenching his jaw. But his brother says nothing so he knows that Sam's right, even though they both don't like it.

 

It takes another douzen rooms before Dean mentions that they're trying to find a place to sleep and Sam can almost taste the relief in the air. It pushes them again for a few more rooms, adrenaline spiking high for a moment, knowing that they can finally rest for a while.

It's Sam who closes the door to the room that looks almost perfect. It's an old one, but the furniture is not layered with dust and the colors are friendly, a warm yellow on the wall, the curtains and cushions and bedding white and clean.

 

\-- + --

 

They decide to settle there for the night. Or, more precisely, what they assume must be the second night. Time has long blurred together, their inner clocks stirrn out of concept and no one of them is sure if it's been really another whole day, or only a few hours, or maybe even more.

The room is good enough, better than the last one even and it only takes a few words to decide who is sleeping where. Troy and the girls huddle together in one of the queens; they barely even fit but Sam watches them lie down and they're out cold the next moment.

Sheriff Atkins takes the chaise longue, he even finds a blanket to cover himself.

Sam and Dean take the other queen.

They don't bother for someone to stand guard this time. They're all tired, all out of strength. Dean has laid out the salt lines this time so they're protected from everything that is a ghost in here. And they're at least ninety-percent sure that nothing will happen as long as they don't open and close any doors.

Dean is lying next to Sam and for all Sam can tell he's right on the way to being fast asleep.

Sam couldn't be further away. His heart is thrumming in his chest, doing double time, although he's lying down, not moving, not doing anything to strain his body.

But his mind is racing, firing up images and pictures, laying emotions bare that Sam had long buried. Memories. Of a time that didn't happen, that had been erased and yet is still present inside his head.

And it's not Hell.

It's something different.

 

"Stop fidgeting, Sam," Dean hisses finally and opens his eyes, locking them with Sam's and this is it.

This is what Sam needs to slow down his mind; this is what he needs to soothe his beating heart.

Dean.

Alive.

His brother is right there, right next to him, but Sam feels frozen to the spot, doesn't know what to do.

The song keeps playing in the background, loud and obnoxiously, and every second Sam has his eyes closed, he fears that when he opens them, Dean will be dead. Or die. Or be gone.

"I mean it," Dean growls but Sam isn't doing anything, only breathing against the panic, against the horror growing in his bones and why doesn't it stop?

He's dead tired, his muscles aching from the lack of sleep and Dean's not better off, he needs his sleep as much as Sam does.

Sam knows, remembers even, that he didn't sleep back then, didn't need any kind of rest. Now his body is different. Needier.

He doesn't know if this is better. With a soul. Set up for suffering.

Sam turns towards his brother, feels the bed swing his moves under them, and Dean blinks again at him, a scowl on his face.

"You can make fun of me tomorrow, okay?" and that's all Sam says before he scoots closer and wraps an arm around his brother, his hand settling over Dean's heart.

"What the hell," Dean whispers and he suddenly sounds confused, but Sam doesn't answer him, not this time, because it's working.

Dean's heart beats against his hand, his brother's warmth tingling in Sam's fingertips and it's working.

Sam lets out a trembling breath and he's so exhausted, so grateful, that he can feel the tears threatening in his eyes.

He doesn't cry though, he smiles. Happily, when the song grows quiet, like someone is turning the volume low.

And although Dean whispers to him, demands to know what the hell he's doing, what the hell is wrong, his brother doesn't move an inch away and Sam is out cold the next minute.


	7. chapter c

_Sioux Falls, South Dakota_

 

"You prayed for me?"

The flutter of wings made Bobby swivel around and even though he was expecting it, requesting it even, he jerked at the sudden presence of the angel.

"Castiel," Bobby nodded his greetings and thanks.

"Bobby," Castiel mirrored him.

"Alright," Bobby said to fill the silence. He felt the weird urge to offer his guest something to drink or a place to sit, but the angel didn't seem to want any of it. So he cut right to the point.

"Do you know what happened to Dean?"

Castiel nodded. "Me."

Bobby's brows shot up. "Excuse me?"

"He is unconscious because I put him there. He's experienced a great head trauma and some severe injuries. I could heal him, but his body needs the rest."

Bobby wiped his hand over his mouth, taking in the information.

"He will wake up soon and be as good as new," Castiel added, as if to reassure Bobby.

Bobby nodded. "Thank you," he said and then added," I guess."

"So this is what got Sam so spooked, huh?" he thought out loud, walking back to his desk where he sat down.

"I don't think that's all that's got Sam ... spooked," Castiel mentioned, emphasizing the last word as if he was only just learning it then, testing it out.

"What do you know?"

The angel hesitated, his eyes traveling the room as if he was ... nervous.

Bobby leaned back and waited for Castiel to talk.

"There were certain ... things, that happened in the house."

"What things?" Bobby pushed.

Castiel didn't meet is eyes. "For one, the house, as I understand it, picked up on Sam's greatest fears and ... replayed them. It's certainly something that really upset him."

"And the other?"

It was almost funny to see how Castiel tried not to meet Bobby's eyes, how he squirmed around the answer although Bobby couldn't think of anything that would link Castiel's weird behavior to the utter terror in Sam Winchester's eyes.

"Their ... relationship ... was tested. I believe Sam is now afraid of what else can separate them. I don't know ... much." Bobby couldn't believe he was actually watching the angel blushing. "I only know what I saw in Dean's head when I healed him. You should maybe ... ask yourself."

With that Castiel was gone, the flutter of his wings fading into nothingness just like him.

"Well," Bobby said to himself, wondering what the case had been doing to Sam and Dean. God knew that their relationship had been tested enough.


	8. chapter c - part one

_Shepherdstown, West Virginia_

 

It's the second time Dean wakes up with Sam curled around him. His brother's hand is resting on his heart, his nose touching Dean's shoulder.

It's still ... different, still kind of awkward, but Dean doesn't really care as much as he would have thought. Sam is sleeping peacefully, his face evened out and his breathing normal, and Dean has seen the opposite just one too many times that he's just thankful he can give Sam this.

If this is what it takes to get Sam to sleep a whole night through and not think of hell, Dean can swallow his manly pride and just cuddle closer and shut up about it.

It's quiet around him. Dean doesn't get up to check, but he can hear soft breathing from the other bed and a softly snoring man from the side. Dean wishes he could see daylight or could have any indication of what time it is. But as it is he doesn't know if he should just go back to sleep or wake the rest of their little group and go on.

The lack of a normal rhythm is going to drive him nuts very soon.

Dean decides not to wake everyone yet. He moves a little, wiggles to the side, because his back is hurting from lying in one position for too long. He shifts Sam's hand with him, Sam's arm dropping away when Dean changes position.

Sam goes rigid immediately.

His breathing changes and there is a frown forming on his face.

"Damn nightmares," Dean curses and reaches out for his brother. He grips Sam's hand, pulling it towards him again and he intends to put it back over his heart, not thinking about what he's actually doing here, he really does, but then Sam opens his eyes and he somehow just stays like that, holding his brother's hand, not even a foot of distance between them.

"Dean," Sam rasps, sleep-groggy and he blinks.

"Shhh," Dean makes but doesn't move either. "You had a nightmare," he whispers into the small space between them, and Dean is looking down for once, with Sam lying closer to the end of the bed.

Sam looks up but doesn't say anything and there's this ... fucking moment between them and Dean can't do anything, can only think that he didn't know he missed this, more so after he shared a bed with Lisa for almost a year and knows what it's like, but ...

It's a terribly sweet, gut clenching feeling as he realizes that he didn't know that he missed Sam like this.

And Sam still doesn't move, doesn't move away and the world around them is swelling with something, vibrating, like it will burst at any given moment and Dean can't do anything but remember how to breathe.

His eyes on his brother.

There's a click next to his ear, the cocking of gun, and Dean's instincts kick in before his conscious mind reacts.

He pushes Sam away from him, simultaneously using the leverage to push himself back, and his brother is just as fast as he is, just as trained, and they're both away from the bed when a shot hisses through the air and hits the mattress, a dull sound, ringing in Dean's ear.

It's the ghost of Thomas James.

Screams are cutting through the room, the girls and Troy trying to hide in a corner and the Sheriff is raising his gun, pointing at the ghost and clearly not sure what to do.

The barrel follows Sam.

So Dean uses the split second he has before another shoot falls and dives for his duffel. Years of training, of making the same move, has his shotgun in his hands in no time and Dean swivels around.

Sam is trapped. He has nowhere to go, is pressed against the wall and trusting his brother to be fast enough.

"Down!" Dean shouts and fires the gun, knows without looking that Sam let himself fall to the floor when the shoot hits and salt is spraying all over the room.

The ghost sizzles for a second, flickers, and then it's gone.

 

\-- + --

 

"Holy fuck!" Dean curses. "How the hell did he get in here?" His eyes flicker to the salt lines that look still intact, still thick and perfect and it should have worked.

"He's a damn ghost!" Dean exclaims and throws his arms in the air, angry and frustrated and, worse than that, clueless.

The others are staring at him in horror, still shocked and shaken up about what happened and Dean remembers how much he hates working with civilians.

In their minds, they're still capable of living a normal life. They don't know what's going on around them, they don't expect all the things lurking in the dark and they can live in blissful ignorance.

The girls, Troy and the Sheriff - it's too late for them. Their life is tainted now.

 

"Didn't you say he was solid?" Sam asks him as he walks over.

"No! I said he felt more solid than a ghost, not that he was solid!"

Sam doesn't react much, only nods, already deep in thought.

Dean wipes over his mouth, feeling the adrenaline leave his body. "Shit, I don't know what that thing is but it's getting in and out just like it wants."

The room is dead quiet. Frozen in a state of shock, again, and Dean wishes that there was something he could do about it, but his hands feel empty, tied behind his back and the only thing he can do, they can do, is react.

"Pack your stuff, let's move on," he orders, barks it into the room, and with a sudden jolt he realizes how he's sounding, why Sam's jaw ticks everytime he does that.

He sounds like their father.

"What the hell is happening to us?" Buffy whispers, and Dean looks up to her, finds her head buried in her hands. "What are these things?"

Answers. Dean swallows heavily. They keep demanding answers and Dean is not sure if he has them, or if he wants to give them.

"They're ghosts. Or, at least we think they are," Sam does it for him, his brother's voice gentle. "They died a violent death and now they're angry, desperate, and that is what keeps them here."

"Like ... what you told us about Amy?" Lauren asks and Sam nods.

"Can you ...," Troy leans forward, sits up on the bed, "Can you stop them? For real?"

Sam hesitates, searches for Dean's look and he's asking a question with his eyes.

Dean shrugs.

It's maybe too late already. Maybe they should know everything there is to know.

"Normally, you'd find their remains, salt and burn them. But in here ... I don't know. Maybe the rules are different in here. I mean the ghosts are different."

"Are we ever gonna find a way out?"

Lauren's question vibrates in the room, hovers over them, and for a moment, nobody says anything.

It's the one question nobody asked out loud before.

Dean answers, when Sam doesn't.

"We're not stopping until we do." Of that, at least, he is sure.

 

\-- + --

 

The next room makes Sam jerk next to Dean, although he's trying his best to hide it.

"Urgh," Buffy makes a disgusted sound as they walk in and it seems like Sam isn't the only one deeply afraid of clowns.

They're everywhere. The room is not too big, a normal living room, but overly packed with clowns in all forms and sizes. Big dolls, pictures on the walls and figurines on tables and shelves.

"This is sick." The Sheriff just takes one glance and shakes his head.

"Let's just go," Dean suggests and he's torn between making fun of his brother and putting a hand on his shoulder to guide him through.

Sam's face is pale, his lips thin and his eyes are laser focused on the door they're walking towards. It's the only other door, no choices to be made.

"Sorry," Dean apologizes when he bumps into Sam, trying not to trip over the collection of ventriloquist's-dolls lying piled up on the floor, and Sam jerks again, hard, and god, has it always been this bad?

He throws a side glance to his brother, still finds him wide-eyed and white-faced and Dean doesn't think twice this time, walks closer to Sam, their shoulders bumping with every step, and he can feel the tension in his brother's body with every simple touch.

"Jeez, Sam, it's just dolls," he whispers," they're not gonna do anything."

His brother nods without meeting his eyes, keeps on walking, but Dean can see how he clenches his jaw, how the grip on his duffel bag gets tighter and Dean gives up. Hopes that it will be better as soon as they leave this goddamn room.

It's only a few more steps and the door lies in front of them, illuminated by the small walllights around it that reveal the whole room.

The door is framed by light, looking like a soft halo, until it's not.

The light goes out with a pang and leaves the group in pitch dark.

"Not again," Dean groans, hearing a sharp intake of breath from somewhere in the front, Lauren maybe or Troy, and he feels his brother freeze next to him.

"The flashlights are not working again," Buffy says from somewhere on the left and he hears her playing with it, hears the click click as she's switching it on and off.

"Only a few steps, come on," Atkins says roughly and then there's movement, slow steps straight ahead.

Dean hears the Sheriff find the door first, hears him feel for the door knob.

White, wonderful light pours into the room as he opens it.

"Alright, let's go." Dean ushers everyone through, no time to test the room, no choice either.

 

\-- + --

 

It's a long and slow morning. They walk and walk, test some doors and walk right through others. Some they keep open, good rooms, clean and simple and nice, by unspoken agreement, and hoping and fearing at the same time, that they might come back here.

There are footsteps behind them twice, slow and heavy and dangerous, just like before, but they're always a room ahead, able to close a door just in time.

They never see the little girl, although Dean sees Sam cover his nose a few times, asking him once if it's ash he smells.

Sam's answer is a quick nod.

The group is getting restless, their spirits slowly fading, and Dean doesn't really know what to do, doesn't know how to convince them that it will all work out as long as they keep going.

Doesn't know how to convince himself.

But stopping and staying is not an option. Eventually, the ghosts will show up and there will be a time when they're not fast enough, when the creatures of this house will get to one of them first.

Dean intends to get out with one more person than they went in with. He doesn't intend to let this house get in the way with that.

 

\-- + --

 

"Hey, are you okay?" Dean asks and he keeps his voice low, only for Buffy to hear.

They're resting in one of the nicer looking rooms, Troy needing the break although Dean's skin is itching under his clothes, his feet tingling and he wants to walk, wants to go on.

But he isn't stupid and Sam made it pretty clear with one look to his brother, that they were going to pause now and somehow Dean hadn't found it in him to argue.

Buffy looks up from her spot on the floor as Dean joins her, her smile shaky but genuine. "I will be. Once this is all over." She nods again, as if to make a point and Dean admires her a little. She's just a civilian. Thrown into a situation like this, all blonde hair and fake nails, and she's still keeping it together better than most people would.

"You're doing great," he assures her. "And we will find a way out. I promise you that."

He doesn't know where he finds the certainty but it's worth it when the hands of the woman in front of him are shaking a little less. She's playing with her flashlight, screwing it open, taking the batteries out, putting them in again and screwing it shut. And then again. And again. Just to keep her hands busy.

Dean doubts that she realizes that she's even doing it.

There's a sound from the other corner of the room, a short quick laugh and they both look up, Dean and Buffy, to find Sam laughing with Lauren, while Troy is making a funny face, a faint smile even on the Sheriff's broody face.

There laughter dies down soon enough, but Dean and Buffy share a smile too when their eyes meet again.

"You know," Buffy starts and her voice has dropped lower," you don't have to lie around us." Her smile is shy now and Dean doesn't understand what she's talking about.

"We can see it," she goes on and her eyes travel down to the floor," how much you love each other. You and Sam ... you're not really brothers, are you?"

Dean is shocked into silence for a moment. Out of everything, it's the last thing his mind would have come up with. Here, now, in a situation like their's.

'Dean, I love my sister. But I wouldn't resurrect her from the dead.' Lisa's words ring in his ears and Dean tries his best to block her out.

Buffy blushes when she looks up, probably worrying that she's said something wrong.

And suddenly Dean is sick and tired of correcting it. It isn't the first time someone assumes it, not even close, and it's not gonna be the last. Dean never understood what made people think that he and Sam were a couple, always assuming that it said a lot about their relationship towards their own siblings, but right now, he's suddenly not so sure anymore.

And more than that, he doesn't care.

So Dean only shrugs, his eyes traveling to Sam without a conscious decision. "He's all I have," Dean tells her and no matter what, that fact never changes.

 

\-- + --

 

"Hey, it's working," Buffy suddenly says from her spot and Dean looks up to her, sees her smiling face first before he sees the flashlight in her hand, glimmering a little.

Actually more than just a little.

"The flashlight?" Sam walks over, curious eyes focused on Buffy's hands and what she's holding.

Sam and Dean share a quick glance, and then they both reach for their own flashlights, only to find out that they're working better too.

"This has to mean something," Sam insists and Dean is right there with him. "I mean, sometimes they're working, sometimes they're not.... and then all of them? It must be the house."

Dean nods, still running it through his head. "They didn't work at all in the hallway," he starts, thinking loudly and waiting for Sam to pick it up.

"And not in the room with the clowns."

Lauren walks over to them; Buffy gets up from her spot on the floor. There's an energy suddenly flooding the room, picking everyone up, filling them with adrenaline.

"We've seen ..." Troy groans when he tries a step forward, putting too much pressure on his injured foot. But he seems determined now. "There are rooms that obviously belong to the house."

Lauren nods. "The study of Thomas James, the Globe Tavern."

"Exactly. And then there are these other rooms. They don't ... fit."

Dean's eyes focus on his brother, as Sam takes a deep breath. "They don't belong to the house. But maybe ...," he waits, hesitates and Dean doesn't know what's going on his brother's mind, only wishes he would as he sees the flicker of something - pain - move over Sam's face.

"Maybe they belong to the people that vanished in here," Sam concludes and he sounds sure about that, not a hint of doubt in his voice.

"Stolen from their memory," Troy adds and Dean watches him and Sam share a look, as if they are sharing a secret and he's not the only one frowning.

Lauren meets his eyes, a question on her face, too.

"Okay, so," Dean tries to sort it out in his head. "We have the rooms that belong to the house, past and present doesn't seem to matter, but they are part of it somehow. And we have the rooms that are memories from other people. The flashlights so far didn't work in the rooms that belonged to other people."

The answer is on the tip on Dean's tongue, just a breath away but then he sees the understanding rush over his brother's face, sees the smile Sam only has when he finds the solution to a problem.

"The flashlights only work in the rooms that actually belong here. That are more real. Sometimes better than others."

Dean nods and lets out a breath he was holding.

Another step in the right direction.

He looks into the faces of their little group, even the Sheriff now standing in the circle they built, and he can see it everywhere.

Hope.

"So, the better the flashlights work," Lauren starts and there's an actual smile forming on her lips.

"The closer we get to finding our way back home," Buffy finishes her thought and she's smiling at her friend, smiling at them all.

Sam and Dean share another look. "Let's find out," they both say and Dean finds himself grinning that he was the faster one.

 

\-- + --

 

The smell hits them first.

Like a morbid choreography, everyone's hands are flying to their mouths and noses, trying to cover up, trying not to let the smell in.

But it's everywhere, the scent of rotting meat, withered fruits and vegetables and sour milk.

"Oh my god," Lauren chokes but takes the first step further inside.

It's an old store, something a supermarket would have been a hundred years ago. The shelves reach up to Dean's head, rotting, wooden shelves, and they're still filled to the brim, stocked up with bags and baskets of food.

The flashlights all shimmer in the semi-darkness, not much, but enough to form small spots of light on the shelves. It's enough to be noticeably stronger than in the room behind them.

"Keep going," Dean says and follows.

It's cold in here, a deep, lingering cold that feels ancient. As if it's survived in the walls and the floor for years and years. Dean shivers, his stomach turning with every step. The smell is still almost unbearable.

"Dean, do you smell this?" Sam whispers to him, alarmed, and Dean turns to his brother and makes the best "duh" face he can muster.

But then Sam's eyes flicker to him and he sees real worry there. "I smell fire."

And it always gets worse.

Dean curses inwardly, doesn't question Sam's words. Something bad is going to happen and he can already feel the hairs on his arms stand up in anticipation.

"Stay together," he shouts to the group, looking into suddenly scared faces as they all wait to walk closer together.

"What's wrong?" The Sheriff asks, his brows furrowed.

"Just be careful."

Dean doesn't want to elaborate, doesn't need to scare them more than they already are.

They keep on walking slowly, more as one group than as individuals. The store is not big, but long and too dark to see everything. And the flashlights only reach so far.

They should be faster than this, should just run through this room and get to the next, but they're frightened and exhausted and they don't have any idea yet where the next door is.

Dean looks over to his brother, finds worry and concentration on Sam's face, and he's asking himself what this place is doing to his brother, why Sam is reacting so much to it, whereas Dean is not.

"Watch out!" the Sheriff suddenly says, bringing the group to a halt, and Lauren lets out a high pitched scream.

Dean has his gun in his hand and is ready to shoot when he sees why they stopped.

"Oh, man," Sam says, turning away.

It's a dead cat, lying in a puddle of water or something else, and it's twice its size already, bloated and now only a clump of fur and meat. It can't be dead for a long time.

"Poor thing," Dean comments, pushing the group to move.

They're halfway there, Dean can make out the end of the shelfves.

"Watch out!" the Sheriff, says again, but this time it's a shout, this time, Dean sees the reason immediately.

"Out of the way!" Sam shouts and the group jumps to the side, Dean can see Troy hiss in pain when he runs and hits one of the shelves on top of it, but he doesn't have time for it, is busy shooting the hell out of his gun.

Amy, the burning little girl, fizzles, vanishing before the salt can hit her, only to reappear a second later.

She's screaming again, screaming her heart out, and she's on fire, her hair and her little red dress, dancing in the flames.

And then Dean can't see her anymore.

"Sam?" he asks, swiveling around to his brother, who is looking as frantically as he is.

"Dean!" comes the scream before Dean can feel the heat, before he can feel fire burning through his shirt where Amy is touching him. And he can't move.

The touch is gluing him to the spot, forcing him to his knees, and Dean is screaming in pain.

Until it's gone and hands grab him, pull him up, and he looks to his brother, spots the ghost of the little girl behind him.

Her face is contorted; it's a mask of anger and pain, and it doesn't look like the face of a little girl. It looks like a monster.

"Sam!" Dean shouts out, when she stretches out her hand, flames swiveling around her tiny hands.

He is faster, though, pushes his brother away and out of her range, pushing them both to opposite sides, hitting the shelves hard.

There are screams in the air and from the corner of his eyes he can see the girls fumbling to their feet, stumbling away when the first shelf starts to sway back, hitting the one behind it, bringing it to fall, and creating a horrible chain reaction.

Shelves are crashing to the floor left and right and Dean loses sight of his brother as he gets back to his feet, only spots the Sheriff for a second before the ball of fire blinds him.

This time he is fast enough to shoot and Amy vanishes again, although he doesn't know if he hit her or not.

Dean makes it to the end of the store. It seems darker now that Amy is not here, and he can't see far enough, can only still hear the loud crashing of shelves and food and boxes hitting the floor.

He doesn't see anybody else.

Not before Amy shows up again, halfway across the room, and she's standing on top of a fallen shelf, illuminating the spot. And Sam, crouching beneath her.

"Sam!"

Dean runs, stumbles, jumps over the shelves, but he isn't fast enough, can't get to his brother fast enough, and he hears Sam scream, feels the ghost of the pain still in his back.

"Sam!"

Dean shoots, aimlessly and too far away, but he can't do anything, and he clenches his jaw, doesn't feel the pain when his feet hit something on the floor or when his knees scrape against the old wood, when he falls.

"Aaargh!"

It's a scream, but not from Sam, and when Dean looks up, he finds Buffy there with his brother, swinging something in the air that must be iron.

Because it hits the ghost of Amy Entler right in the middle of her small body; the ghost sizzles, flickers, and then the light goes out and she vanishes.

Dean feels a hysteric laugh bubble up in his chest. "She's a regular slayer, our Buffy." He grins, knowing that she's not hearing it, but he is damn proud of her right now.

His throat constricts again as he sees something swing above them, above Sam and Buffy, because Dean is close enough now, close enough to hear the terrible cracking in the ceiling and he recognizes a chandelier, huge and heavy, threatening to fall down any moment.

Right on his brother.

"Sam, watch out!" Dean shouts and he can see how they're looking up, only now noticing the threat and it's too late, it must be too late.

Dean doesn't make another step, can't, when heat is suddenly radiating behind him, burning into his back, and he jumps around, falls backwards, as Amy is standing so close, reaching out her hand.

This time, the salt hits her right in the face.

And the sound is loud, amplified by the sound of the chandelier crashing to the floor, and by the sizzling of the ghost.

As she vanishes, for good, for now, the room goes dark and quiet.

Dean doesn't hear a thing.

 

\-- + --

 

"Sam? Buffy?" Dean gets up to his feet, feels his bones aching and the faint pain of bruisers to come, but his mind is only set on finding Sam. He finds his flashlight a few feet away, luckily not buried under stinking meat and molding food, and he aims the light before him, illuminating the chaos around.

He comes to the chandelier, his heart threatening to burst out of his chest, but there's nothing there but the chandelier. No Buffy. No Sam.

"Sam? Anyone?"

His voice echoes through the room, bouncing back without an answer.

"Jesus," Dean whispers to himself. "Where the hell is everybody?"

Dean makes it to the other end of the room, he doesn't remember where they came in, only knows that he hasn't been here before. There are a few shelves still standing, right against the wall, and there's a door, wide open, nothing but darkness behind it.

"Dean," comes a rough voice from behind him and Dean turns, the spot of his flashlight hitting the Sheriff's bloody face. There is a nasty cut on his forehead, but other than that, he seems okay.

"Go find the kids," Dean orders and Atkins nods.

Then Dean crosses the threshold, steps into the next room.


	9. chapter c - part two

He finds his brother a second later, Sam's eyes widening as they fall on him.

"Dean!" He doesn't look hurt, only a few cuts and scratches that Dean can see, but he looks confused and exhausted, a weird look on his brother's face.

"Jesus Christ, Sam, I thought you vanished on us!" Dean shouts and it's more relief than anger.

"Dean!" Sam says his name again, and he sounds like he thought Dean had been gone too.

Dean smirks uneasily, tries to shake off the weird vibe that's rapidly building up in the room. He doesn't know what it is but he doesn't really want to know it either. The smell is not so bad in here, but the room is cold in a wrong way, and all Dean wants is to leave.

"Alright, Sammy, let's get back to the others, okay?"

He's almost turned around, doesn't see Sam anymore, when suddenly he's abruptly pulled back around.

He's engulfed by strong arms, pulled into a hug tight enough to press the air out of his lungs. Sam shudders, whimpers, and fear grips Dean's throat.

"Sammy," he whispers into the space his brother is still giving him. He feels the stubble of Sam's cheek against his neck, feels him panting against his skin and he tries to hold him close, tries to tighten the grip on his own now, returning the hug as much as he can, because he feels desperate, feels out of the loop with Sam breaking apart like this.

The next second, he feels his brother's lips on his own.

"Mpfh," Dean makes, instinctively pushing his hands against the tight grip Sam has on him. But Sam doesn't budge, doesn't give for an inch.

It's not a kiss, not really, just a dry press of lips on lips, and Sam is desperate, trembling against Dean's body.

Dean fights him. He tries to pull away or push Sam, but his brother's grip is like a vice, Dean can already feel the bruisers forming on his arms where Sam is holding him.

Dean fights Sam until he does the only other thing that comes to his mind.

He kisses back.

It's a small tilt of his head at first, a small push against his brother's lips.

Sam makes a tiny, desperate noise against his mouth and Dean can feel a shudder run through his brother's body, hard enough to affect even him.

Dean doesn't stop. He gently moves his lips against Sam's, just a tender, slow glide until it doesn't hurt anymore, until Sam's backing up enough that Dean can breathe again through his nose.

Dean opens his mouth a little, sucks Sam's lower lip in between his own. He reacts on instinct now, doesn't even think about what he's doing. Dean is only adjusting himself to Sam, to Sam's needs. Just like he always does.

Sam sobs against him.

"Shhh," Dean soothes in the small space between their lips. Sam is pliant against him now, his body all but melting against Dean's.

Dean takes his chance and moves his hands up, catching his brother's head between his palms, and gently curls his fingers behind Sam's ears.

"Shh, Sammy," Dean says again and their eyes are closed, Dean knows Sam is only breathing against him now, feels his skin burn where Sam's forehead touches his and where Sam's breath touches Dean's mouth.

Dean pulls away when he hears Sam's breath even out a little. "Look at me, Sammy," he tells his brother, tilts his head up enough that they're face to face, still close enough to breathe each other's air, and Sam does open his eyes now and catches Dean's gaze.

Dean can see a storm rage on his brother's face.

"Sammy." Dean can't tell what he sees, can't make out one emotion from the other. But he feels Sam's pulse beneath his hands, can see his brother's look dart to his mouth and back up again, can taste the fear that is riding Sam.

"It's okay, Sammy, you hear me? It's okay." Dean doesn't know if Sam can hear him, but he keeps on talking, keeps on swiping his thumb over his brother's cheek until he's said it countless times, until Sam's eyes clear up just a little.

"I need you to get a grip, Sammy, okay?" Dean pleads with his brother, smiling against the urge to scream and run and cry. "I need you sharp and at my side here, okay?" He waits for Sam to nod, for him to react at all, but what he gets is a flutter of Sam's lids; the only hint that Sam is actually listening to him.

"Sammy, please."

Dean can hear the others now, can hear them coming closer. They're probably looking for them, worried, scared, and Dean can't lose another second.

He shakes his brother, gently but firmly. "Come on, Sam, listen to me. I can't do this alone, alright? These people need us, Sammy, they're just barely kids. You gonna have to help me, you understand?"

There's someone calling their names from around the corner, Atkins is shouting for them, and suddenly Sam seems to wake up. He jerks in Dean's grip, tries to pull free, but Dean holds on.

"Dean," Sam starts and he sounds shocked, sounds like he wants to apologize. He sounds like he wants to run.

But Dean doesn't let him. "I told you, it's okay, Sammy, alright?"

"Alright?" he asks again when his brother doesn't answer and this time, Sam nods.

"Alright," Dean breathes out and let's go of Sam. His hands are tingling weirdly when they step apart.

"You gonna be okay?" Dean asks him once again under his breath, can already hear the footsteps now. He's close.

"Yeah," Sam answers and looks away when Sheriff Atkins finally rounds the corner.

 

\-- + --

 

"You guys look a little spooked," Atkins states roughly. "Everything okay?"

Sam freezes next to him. "Let's just go."

"Where are the others?" Dean asks and looks around. It seems like the noise he heard was only the Sheriff.

Dean watches the older man visibly pale. "I thought they were with you. I thought they followed Sam."

"No."

Dean feels something spreading inside him, a terrible feeling, a bad anticipation. He looks up to Sam but his brother is still too out of it, too shaken up, to really grasp what it could mean.

"Troy?!" Dean shouts and crosses the room, enters the store whose doors are still wide open. "Lauren?! Buffy?!"

He moves faster, walks faster, until he breaks into a run. He hears his brother and the Sheriff following him but other than that, he hears nothing. No sign of the kids.

"Jesus, where are you?!"

He runs between the shelves, looks everywhere twice, runs back into the room he just came from, and finds two other rooms which doors are open.

They're not there.

"Fuck," Dean curses as the bad feeling in his gut settles.

They closed a door.

They could be anywhere.

 

\-- + --

 

"We have to find them," Dean states, maybe for the fifteenth time but he refuses to stop, refuses to consider the chance that they might be lost in this maze forever.

"We will," Sam answers quietly from the side and he doesn't meet Dean's eyes when they turn to Sam.

It's another corridor, another hallway, and Dean is sick of them, doesn't need to see them ever again. They're all too narrow, too thin and bare and empty. They're all long enough that Dean can't see the end, and in a twisted logic he feels more trapped here than in the rooms. Nowhere to go but forward, knowing that behind them is only more of the same.

They're all tensed, all on the edge, with the kids gone and them not really closer to finding a way out.

Sam is walking as far away from Dean as possible, always making sure that the Sheriff is between them and Dean is not sure if he wants to change that.

There is something ...

Dean coughs, swallows heavily and pushes the thoughts away. It's not the time to think about Sam. They have to find the kids first. They have to get out.

 

"Do you think they went this way?" the Sheriff asks as they stop at the end of the hall, a small, thin, white door lying in front of him. Atkins is aiming his flashlight right towards it, the shine yellowish but bigger. Almost good.

"Doesn't matter," Sam says and he sounds sure, so sure that Dean looks up to him and meets his eyes briefly.

He watches Sam blush before Dean averts his eyes. It's ridiculous.

"If they keep on doing what we do, choosing the doors by the strength of the flashlights," he looks from the Sheriff to Dean and back," they'll eventually find the right way."

Dean nods. "Every door can lead to every room. But there's only one real house."

The Sheriff halts, scrunches his face as if he's thinking it through. Then he nods his head, showing the relief that Dean feels. "We should go on then."

Dean is the one who opens the door. The room that lies behind it is completely empty and is just big enough to hold all three of them.

"Ready?" Dean asks just before he closes the door behind them.

They watch the room change.

Then the Sheriff gasps out loud and freezes.

 

\-- + --

 

It's a class room. An older one, without all the fancy new technical stuff schools have nowadays. Dean counts fifteen tables and the teacher's desk. The blackboard is empty, but there is no dust, nothing really old or rotten or falling apart.

Outside, the sun is shining down on an empty schoolyard.

"This can't be," Sam gasps next to Dean and Dean watches his brother try out the flashlight, sees no change when Sam switches it on and off. "It's not a part of the house."

"It's..." the Sheriff starts and his voice is shaking, just like his hands are. "It's from my memory."

"What the hell is going on?" Dean shares a look with Sam, both of them equally confused.

"It's my old class room, from fifth grade, I... ." The old man stops, his hand going to his throat.

"Why this room? What happened in this room?" Sam asks but Atkins doesn't react, only stares ahead.

As if it's the scariest thing he has ever seen.

"Dean, look."

Sam's whisper hits Dean's ear and he shudders involuntary, but then his eyes fall on the Sheriff. Sam and he both watch Atkins walk over to the desk in the front, watch him sitting down and stare at the empty blackboard.

"What is he doing?" Dean asks, a bad feeling building in his gut.

"Don't know." Sam shakes his head beside him and they're both forced to stare, nothing to do but stare to figure out what's going on.

Suddenly, Sheriff Atkins wheezes, grips his chest, and his face is turning red.

"Fear!" Sam suddenly shouts out. "Dean, it's fear! This room is creating fear and it's gonna kill him!"

They both run over to the Sheriff, grabbing him, but they don't know what to do, don't know how to help a dying man.

Atkins' eyes meet Dean's, and they're already dead, already empty, and Dean gasps, swears loudly at how helpless they are.

Then the wall cracks.

Sam and Dean both look up to see the crack going up to the ceiling, and dust is raining down on them. The blackboard is next, crashing down to the floor with a loud thud and bursting into pieces.

"Dean, we gotta go," Sam says, his eyes wildly tracking the room.

"We can't!" Dean bits out, his hands still gripping the Sheriff.

"Dean, the host dies, the room does too," Sam explains and it's so simple, so easy and logical, and Dean hates that Sam is right.

"Dammit."

They both get up, arms above their heads to protect them from the ceiling coming down in pieces.

The door is not far away, pulled back open in another second, but it feels like walking a mile and pulling open a fire door to Dean.

The room doesn't change back though, keeps on falling apart, bursting, and Dean's eyes falls on the dead Sheriff, head on his little schooldesk, before he and his brother get outside.

 

\-- + --

 

The white door closes.

And vanishes in front of their eyes.

"Goddammit!" Dean shouts and bangs against the wall, empty and innocent, as if it didn't just bury a man in there.

He hears his brother behind him, hears him panting and it's loud, loud in the heavy silence surrounding them. When he turns around, he finds Sam on the floor, looking as defeated as Dean feels.

Dean closes his eyes for a moment.

There's a moment, one, terrible moment, when Dean loses hope. It washes over him, intending to sweep him away: a deep, cold hopelessness, but then Sam draws in another breath and Dean follows his example and the moment vanishes.

He stands up, clenches his jaw and his fists, and he turns away from the door, shoulders his duffel and walks back down, not intend to look back.

Sam follows.

 

"I want answers now, Sam, no remaining silent, no lying." He doesn't look back but he feels Sam's eyes boring into the back of his head. "I don't want to hear any excuses. I wanna know what's going on. And I want to know it now."

"Dean."

Dean hears the defeat in Sam's voice.

"I'm seeing ... things. Since we're here. Things you don't. Nobody does."

Dean turns around, stares at Sam. "What things?"

Sam shakes his head, avoiding his brother's eyes. "I think it's ... the house. It's picking up on fears. Showing them to you, showing you what scares you the most."

Dean wonders what it was that scared the Sheriff so much about the classroom, but now they'll never know. It won't make a difference.

And then his mind wanders to all the things he knows Sam is afraid of, or at least was, as a kid.

"Tell me, Sammy, are you seeing dead people?" Dean bites out, and he doesn't even know if it's an attempt to be funny or mean, but his stomach plummets as he watches his brother's face go pale, watches the light fade from his eyes.

"Yes, Dean. You," Sam answers and his voice is trembling a little; not enough that anyone else would have picked up on it, but Dean hears it loud and clear. "I see you. Dead. Sometimes still alive and screaming in pain. But dead most of the time."

His brother's eyes meet Dean's like a challenge, like a "come on, how are you gonna make fun of that now?", but Dean swallows against a sudden lump in his throat and says nothing.

Sam sighs and all the fight leaves his frame. He keeps on walking slumped as he realizes that Dean's not gonna fight him on this. "Every single room we walk in, every time we close another door." Sam closes his eyes, trying to shield himself from what Dean knows he's feeling, what Dean can see Sam's feeling in his brother's face and the way he's holding himself.

"Jesus, Sammy," Dean breathes out and he has his eyes closed for a moment. He stops to face his brother, forces Sam to stop too in the thin hallway. "Why didn't you tell me?"

His brother huffs, doesn't say that he didn't know where to start, doesn't tell him that it is just one more thing wrong about him, one more thing making him weak, but he says it all with his eyes and Dean understands him somehow.

"This house - something's happening here, Dean. And I don't know why, I don't understand ..."

"Okay." Dean reaches out on instinct, touches a hand to Sam's shoulder and for a moment it's okay, for a moment it's the comfort it's supposed to be. But then Dean realizes that it's not what they do, it's not how they act, and especially not after...

Dean pulls back but still catches Sam's eyes, waits for a nod from his brother.

"It doesn't change anything, Sammy. We're gonna find the kids and then we're gonna get out and this whole nightmare will be over."

Sam stays silent, his eyes on the floor, and Dean just knows that there's another objection sitting right on the tip of his brother's tongue.

"Dean, we can't just leave. Who knows how many people are trapped in here, dying in here? We can't leave and look the other way!"

Dean stares at his brother open-mouthed. "Are you - literally - insane?!"

Sam's lips draw into a thin line.

"Sammy, there's no way we're gonna stay. We're leaving. And then we can figure out what to do, stick around for as long as you like, but we're getting out first. No discussion." It's settled for Dean, right here and now, and he's not letting Sam get his way, not with this.

The sooner they leave this place, the better.

 

\-- + --

 

They continue their way in silence.

Sam keeps walking one step behind Dean, and there is this ... vibe again, this unspeakable thing growing and morphing and mutating between them and Dean wants it to stop, but doesn't know how.

So he does nothing. Opens one door after the other, and he feels terrible for thinking it but they're so much faster now, making more rooms now that they're only the two of them.

They walk back to the store, take another door this time and nothing happens, although Dean's finger would be happy now to pull the trigger.

He doesn't. There is nothing to shoot, nobody showing up, neither the ghost of the man or the little girl.

And not one of the kids.

 

"I remember this," Sam whispers, his eyes traveling through the room.

It must be hours later, Dean can't really tell, and it's the first time that Dean actually stops to pay attention to what he's seeing.

Dean looks around. It does look familiar, but he's seen so many rooms looking all the frigging same, he would never know for sure.

"Really?" he asks Sam because he's not stupid. His brother might actually be sure about those kind of things.

Sam nods, his face in a frown, and then he walks back a few steps, turns around, as if he's trying to look at the room from another angle.

Then his face changes completely, lighting up as if he found what he was looking for.

"We've been here before," Sam announces.

And then he walks right over to another door, ripping it wide open.

And now Dean does remember.

It's the room with the bench and the door to the outside Buffy had tried to open. It's the one with the window showing that beautiful meadow outside. It still looks absolutely the same.

And now Dean remembers this room too, one of three that belonged to the same section, where the room didn't change once you closed the door.

There's the white and the yellow door.

"The kitchen is right behind it," Sam explains and walks to the yellow door and Dean can only grab his arm to stop him.

"Whoa, wait for a second there, Sammy."

His brother turns around and catches his eyes and Dean knows that look, knows determination when he sees it on his brother's face.

"What the hell are you planning to do?"

"Dean," Sam starts. "If I'm right, the kitchen belongs to Amy's part of the house. Maybe we can find something from her. Maybe we can stop her."

Dean halts. He immediately doesn't like it.

But deep down he knows that Sam is right. They have to go and find her first, stop her first, before they can think about getting out of this nightmare.

He doesn't say anything, only passes his brother and reaches for the yellow door, his actions being answer enough.

 

\-- + --

 

It smells worse than he thought.

He hasn't smelled this in a long time. Fire, yes. Fire devouring bones, but a room, almost burned down, furniture and carpets and walls all victim to the fire...

It's a different kind of smell.

One that's carved deep inside Dean.

"Do you see anything?" Dean asks his brother, speaking through the sleeve he's covering his mouth with.

Sam doesn't answer right away.

They're both looking for it, looking for clues, but all Dean can see right now is black ash and something only faintly resembling an old kitchen.

There's nothing much left of it. The table in the middle of the room is now a pile of ash and dirt, the furniture against the wall almost burned down to the ground too. Dean can only see a part of an old plate or cup here and there, tiny little pieces that tell him what this room had been used for.

"Here," Sam suddenly says and Dean turns around to find his brother, seeing him by the wall, already pulling on a beam from the ceiling. "Dean, help me."

Dean steps closer, grips for another unidentifiable piece of wood and pries it away.

Now he can see the small door lying behind it.

 

It takes them longer to clear the path than Dean would have thought. The boards and beams are heavy, glued together by age and dust. He's sweating by the time they're done and then remembers how long it has been since he had a nice long shower.

"Sam, be careful, dammit," Dean hisses when his brother just reaches out for the door and turns the knob.

"Jesus."

Dean follows Sam, climbing over the last remaining pile of dirt and through the door, and they both enter the small nursery.

It is perfectly intact.

Amy is sitting on her bed.

Dean freezes next to his brother. He doesn't dare to move, his eyes fixed on the little girl, that is only staring at them, her head cocked to the side, eyes wide.

And sad.

Her hair is on fire, a low, sizzling sound that is singing in the air, but she doesn't move, only sits there in her perfect little room, with no dust on the furniture, looking like she just went to bed here last night.

"Sam," Dean warns when his brother starts to move, makes a tentative step forward.

His heart is beating in his throat, his hand ready to go for the shotgun in his duffel.

But nothing happens.

Amy's dead, glowing eyes follow his brother's every move, but she makes no indication of reacting, just seems to wait to see what Sam is gonna do.

Just like Dean.

"Sammy," Dean hisses when his brother reaches her bed, kneels down before her.

But then he sees what Sam must have spotted before him, sees the tiny little matchbox in the child's hands.

Sam reaches out a hand, offers her his palm, silently asking. Dean watches Amy's eyes fall on Sam's hand, watches her face change and now she looks like the little girl she was, young and innocent.

Dean lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding when Amy moves, slowly, carefully placing the matchbox into Sam's hand. He takes a step towards his brother, when Sam moves his arm, and Dean plucks the matchbox out of his brothers hand, his eyes never leaving Amy.

She's watching him. With the same sad silence she is following Dean's every move as he puts the box down, pulling the salt and his own lighter out of his duffel.

It's over in seconds. The matchbox lights up in a high flame that dies down fast, taking the whole box with it.

Dean looks up again, meets the little girls eyes one last time before she flickers.

And she vanishes.

 

Sam stands up again, taking a deep breath and their eyes lock, nothing needs to be said out loud that they can't share with one look.

Then the bed suddenly lights up in flames, high and hot immediately, and Sam jumps back, almost crashing into his brother.

"We should leave," he says, both of them watching the little carpet go up in flames, her tiny dresser catching fire.

"You think?" Dean pulls Sam with him, almost pushes him through the small door back into the kitchen. They don't stop there, the heat already following them and it's loud now, the fire making no pause to take the whole room with it.

They make it back into the room with the bench, seeking the sunlight from the window, even if it's not real, even if they're still trapped. But the yellow door is closed and the sound of fire gone.


	10. chapter c - part three

Dean lets himself glide down the wall, gives in to his shaking knees. He needs a break, needs five frigging minutes to take a breath and get his strength back. He feels it in bones, every battle they've taken since they got trapped in this nightmare and it's the first one they won.

But the war is far from over.

A giggle forces itself past his throat, and he starts chuckling, laughing, when a thought comes to his mind.

Sam is standing across from him, arms on his knees, calming himself down. His brother shoots him a lopsided grin, half amused, half afraid. "What is it?"

"You know," Dean starts, letting his head fall back against the wall. "We killed the damn ghost that's been trying to set us on fire all this time. We at least know how to fight the other ghost that's been trying to shoot you."

'And?' Sam asks with the raise of an eyebrow.

"Sammy, we could kill all the ghosts we like, we're still not any closer to finding out what the deal is with this friggin' house." He shrugs. "I mean, is it a curse? Witchcraft? Another demi-god playing with our lives, what? We got no clue."

Dean recognizes the look on his brother's face as soon as the words leave his mouth. He knows that look. He hates that look.

It always tells him that Sam knows something Dean doesn't. And that Dean won't like it.

"Spill," Dean says, his voice completely even. He's too tired to be angry.

Sam straightens, looks twice his size from where Dean is sitting and he folds his arms across his chest, as if he's trying to brace himsef. From Dean.

"It's human."

Dean's eyes grow wide. "What?"

"The house, what it's doing. It's a human. Not a curse, or a god, or a freaking Mystery Spot."

Sam spits the last words out with a force that sends a shiver down Dean's spine.

"Dean, we've both been to hell. For decades," Sam gestures wildly and Dean is afraid of what is about to come. "And yet we're still here. We're not ... blowing up kindergartens or banging our heads against a padded wall 24/7. Hell is supposed to be a place so bad you wouldn't even be able to imagine. But it isn't."

Dean's answer gets stuck in his throat. The hairs on his arms are standing on end. His gut churns and twists, almost everything inside him violently ready to protest.

Almost everything.

There is a tiny voice inside his mind, that tells him that Sam is right.

"It isn't," Sam repeats," because demons have long forgotten how humans really tick. What scares them, what hurts them the most. This house? It knows."

Dean feels himself go sick at Sam's words. At the idea of what Sam must be going through since they entered this place. He doesn't know, he knows Hell and he still doesn't know what kind of nightmare put the words into Sam's mouth and that look on his brother's face.

"You think there's a human behind this?" he croaks. "An actual human being? Sitting around somewhere and doing this to us?"

Sam's determination doesn't vanish. "I'm talking about a ghost. Of whatever is stuck here that's been human not a long time ago. Think about it, Dean. Why am I seeing things and not you? Why Troy and not Lauren? It chooses."

"Troy's seeing things, too?" Dean asks, surprised, but Sam just ignores it.

"It's choosing its victims. Dean, it chooses siblings. Brothers."

Dean is quiet for a moment, not sure if he's following Sam.

"Atkins?" he simply asks.

Sam nods. "An exception, but not really. I talked to the Sheriff. He and his nephew were close, they were living in the same house. He was more like a little brother to him."

"So a nutjob who hates siblings. A very, very powerful nutjob," Dean concludes.

Sam bites down on his lip. "I'm sure it has something to do with the Entler brothers. I just don't know what yet."

 

\-- + --

 

They find a trace of the kids seven rooms later.

"Dean," Sam says and it's the first time he's spoken to Dean in all that time.

Dean follows his brother's gaze, his now stronger flashlight hitting a small bag, lying on the floor. "That's Lauren's," he states and a surge of hope grabs him.

They could still be okay. They could still be alive.

"This way," Sam says, hand already on a doorknob.

"How do you know?" Dean looks up to his brother, and then back around the room. It's a living room, complete with an old sofa and two arm chairs, and there are four doors not including the one they just walked in from.

And the one Sam is going to open won't change. Dean can see the doorhandle, the subtle swing at the end that is formed as a feather. The same feather he can see on two other doors and the glasses in a vitreous cupboard on the wall.

"I heard her," Sam simply says and opens the door.

"Lauren!" Dean pushes past Sam into the room, finding the girl standing in the middle and shaking like a leaf, her arms slung around her body.

She sobs as she sees them, but her eyes are dry, her face pale.

"Are you okay?" Sam asks, gently placing a hand on her shoulder.

She nods slowly.

"Lauren, where's your brother? Where's Buffy?"

"I don't know," she whispers and she's still shaking violently, her teeth rattling. "I lost them, I don't even remember, I ... there was this room, full of snakes and ..."

Dean's eyes fly up to his brother's.

"You're safe now," Sam tells her, tries to make her look up to him. "You understand? You got out of that room. You're safe now. Okay? Calm down."

Dean is holding his breath until she visibly calms down, until the shaking finally stops.

 

"Ready to go?" Dean asks then and they collect her bag from the room behind them, shouldering their duffels, ready to move on.

Lauren hesitates, looks from Dean to Sam and back. "Where's the Sheriff?"

Dean clenches his jaw. "He didn't make it."

 

\-- + --

 

"Okay, close it," Dean says to Lauren when he and Sam are ready. It's their only way, this room not having another door but the shine of the flashlight is almost completely steady. It's the right way.

The girl nods and shuts the door behind them.

The room doesn't just change this time, it's stretches, widens. And it darkens.

"Holy..."

It's not a room anymore but a hall, massive, bigger than a handful of football fields. Dean looks up and thinks that, no, it's not a hall; it's a giant cave, darkness on the edges.

And in front of them is a giant gap in the floor, a canyon. When Dean steps forward, he can't see the ground.

There's a bridge going to the other side, made of wood and nails and rope, and it looks as if it's barely holding itself together.

Dean groans. He doesn't need to be a genius to know that this room can not be a part of the original house.

He tries it anyway, points his flashlight into the hall.

The light gets swallowed completely.

"Wait."

Sam reaches for his hand, guides his flashlight and for a moment, Dean can't think beyond the touch of his brother's hand, can't feel anything but Sam's hand on his wrist and what it does to him.

"See?" Sam says and he sounds excited enough to make Dean look up.

There's light at the other end of the bridge, a soft spot on a door there that looks so out of place, but so promising at the same time. The light doesn't shine all the way there, but only there, the bridge illuminated by something else, something they can't see.

And there are people on the other side.

"Troy!" Lauren suddenly shouts, almost starts to run before Sam grabs her by the arm and stops her.

"Lauren!" come the shouts from the other side, Buffy and Troy beaming enough that Dean can see it from here.

Dean watches his brother sigh in relief, closing his eyes for a moment and Dean's right there with him. They have more luck than they're used to, finding the kids a second time.

If only they can make it to the other side.

"Is the bridge safe?" Dean shouts to cross the distance.

He swears he can see Troy and Buffy share a concerned look.

"Be careful!" is Troy's answer and really, they don't have another option anyway.

"I'll go last," Sam announces and Dean bites down a retort, because his brother is right. He's the heaviest, stupid tall frame and nothing but muscles.

Lauren goes first.

Her footsteps are careful, slow, and Dean fights the need to urge her on, make her go faster.

"You can do it," he hears Buffy say, hears both her and Troy cheering her on.

The bridge creaks loudly when Lauren hits the middle, but other than that, it works. Lauren arrives on the other side, safe and sound, and is engulfed in her brother's and her friend's arms immediately.

"You next," Sam says unnecessarily, and meets Dean's eyes for a second before he looks away.

Dean nods, although nobody sees it, grabs his duffle a little tighter and starts walking.

The bitch is wigglier than it seemed to be, almost feeling like giving in underneath Dean's carefully placed steps. There's is also a wind he didn't feel before, a wind he doesn't know where it's coming from, but it makes it all the more harder to balance.

Dean grips the rope tight on both sides, doesn't dare to look down, keeps his eyes firmly trained on the others waiting.

"I feel like the freaking Goonies," he states, more to calm himself than everything else.

"I was expecting something more along the lines of Indiana Jones," Sam shouts to him from behind and Dean knows what he's doing, knows that his brother is only trying to distract him from the frigging height.

"Nah," Dean answers," too many kids."

There's another crack the bridge makes, echoing loudly in the hall, and Dean gulps heavily, but keeps on walking.

Another heartbeat, another silent prayer to whoever is listening, and Dean is on the other side.

He hears the girls and Troy letting out deep breaths and he's greeted with wide smiles.

Dean turns back around, back to Sam.

"Sammy, be careful," he says, silently to himself, because Sam can't hear him like that, and he watches his brother step on the bridge.

They're all holding their breaths now, watching him take step after step and Sam looks scarily out of place there, way too big, his hands huge on the small rope that is supposed to carry him.

And of course, of course, when Sam is almost on the other side, the bridge creaks again, louder this time, and then the first board falls into the deep dark nothingness.

Buffy screams next to him and Dean runs, as far to the edge as he can, and reaches out his hands, watching Sam hurry over the rest of the bridge, watching it break down and fall behind his brother.

It feels like hours, dragged in slow motion, but it's only seconds until Sam is almost there, until he jumps the last part and their hands grip each other tight, Dean pulling him in, with him, just as the whole bridge breaks away from the edge.

Only later, Dean will remember that they never heard it hitting the ground.

But now he's busy wiggling free under the weight of his brother, pulling them both up into a sitting position, and Dean has his brother's face in his hands without thinking, searching Sam's eyes, checking for injuries.

"Are you okay? Sammy?"

His brother nods, still panting, but he nods, meeting Dean's eyes.

And now Dean is aware of what he's doing, of how they're sitting here, and a day before this wouldn't have meant something, but now it does and Dean does his best to scramble away.

A shot rings through the darkness.

It hits the wall, sending splinters flying all over them and Dean doesn't need light to know that it's the ghost of Thomas James on the other side. Shooting.

"Go, go, go!" Dean shouts, getting back up on his feet and pulling Sam with him, pushing the others through the door they saw from the other side, no time to check, no choice either.

 

\-- + --

 

It's an empty room, no furniture, no windows, not even a carpet on the floor. There is only one other door and they open it quietly, finding another room just like this one behind it.

And after that.

And after that.

Dean doesn't know how long they've been walking until the next room looks a little different, with wallpapers and a stone floor. Until something else is different.

"It's working again," Lauren breathes, looking down on her flashlight. "I mean it's ... fully working again."

Dean looks over, tries his own.

She's right.

"We're close," Troy says and he smiles, happy but as if he still doesn't really believe it yet.

Again, there's only one other door in the room, looking thin and normal.

Lauren tries to move the door handle.

It's locked.

 

\-- + --

 

"No," Buffy whispers. "No. Nononononono, oh God no."

"Okay, keep calm. We're gonna figure this out." Dean speaks with a conviction he doesn't feel, but they're not gonna give up so close to victory.

They know it. They all know it.

Home is lying right behind that door.

"Sam, help me here." The others step back, making room for Sam and Dean, and together, the brothers try to pull the door open with brutal force.

It doesn't give.

"Dammit!" Dean curses as they step away. He wipes a hand over his mouth, his mind spinning with trying to think, trying to find a solution.

"Maybe we can go back, find something to break the door with," Troy suggests.

Dean thinks it over, the kid has a point.

But Sam shakes his head. "We will only make it to the hall with the canyon. And the rooms after that had all been almost empty." His voice is low, as if he has a hard time delivering the bad news.

"Maybe it's a riddle." Lauren looks hopeful with her words, catching Dean's eyes, then Sam's. "Maybe it wants us to solve something, maybe there's some inscription."

Again, Sam shakes his head and Dean hates to see it, knows that Sam is - somehow - right again. His brother understands this house better than he does, better than they all do.

"It doesn't care about logic and riddles," Sam explains. "It doesn't really want to play with us. It only cares about..."

Sam stops talking and all eyes fly up to him, waiting for his next words.

"Sam, you have an idea?" Dean pries, he can read it already on his brother's face.

Sam meets Dean's gaze. "Dean, it only cares about siblings, only traps siblings." His brother turns around, facing Buffy. "Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

Buffy hesitates, looks from one to the other in confusion. "No," she shakes her head. "I'm an only child."

"You open the door." Sam and Dean say at the same time, Dean having picked up on his brother's train of thoughts.

"Me?" Buffy frowns. "But how can I...?"

"Just try it," Lauren tells her, a smile ghosting on her face and Buffy looks to her friend and nods.

They all watch her with bated breath, anticipation lying like a blanket above them.

Dean watches her hand shake as she reaches for the door, as she gently presses down the wooden door handle.

It goes all the way down, and with a soft click, the door opens.

"Oh, God," Buffy draws in a sharp breath, not believing that it actually worked.

And then something seems to snap.

Buffy is the first, a jolt going through her body and suddenly she starts running, is out of the room and in the corridor. "Buffy!" Lauren squeals and follows her, Troy not far behind, running on his own although his face is a mask of pain.

Sam and Dean are not spared. A weird, sudden rush of adrenaline makes them run, makes them follow the kids and Dean hears the door swing around behind, feels the brush of air as the doors slams shut after them.

They don't stop to look, they keep on running and the room shifts fully under their feet and it feels solid somehow, real in a way the last days hadn't ever. They make it up the stairs, entering a kitchen they've seen before.

They only stop there, only come to a halt when Dean throws another door shut behind them.

 

\-- + --

 

The door slams back into its hinges and the sound echoes violently through the room. It bounces off walls, empty walls with white spots, and kitchen counters, old and cluttered with dust. It lets the window clank, one where pure, natural sun is shining through and that shows a small part of German Street, with cars driving by. With people walking down the street.

"We're back," Lauren breathes, her voice so thin Dean almost can't hear her. "Ohmygod, we're back."

And then she breaks. Finally loses her posture, her knees giving out under her and she falls to the floor and starts crying, heavy tremors shaking her body. Her brother follows behind. He clings to her, one arm wrapped around her torso and Buffy's on the other side, streaks of tears on her face too and they create a shaking bundle, laughing and crying in relief.

Dean doesn't bother to get up from the floor, just turns his head around. He looks for Sam, wants to make sure his brother is okay too, wants to see the look in his eyes now that they made it. That they got out.

When he turns, when he finds Sam, his brother is already standing and the look on his face breaks Dean's heart.

Sam looks directly at him, unshed tears in his brother's eyes.

He looks as if he's saying goodbye.

"I can end this," his brother whispers.

"Sam?" Dean's voice doesn't sound like his own, panic already gripping him tight when his conscious mind doesn't yet understand what's going on.

And then Sam's moving.

He takes a few steps backwards, vanishes down the stairs through the small kitchen door without hesitation. Dean hears his footsteps going down, growing more silent with every step.

He hears him opening a door downstairs, knows it's the storage room, knows it's the room.

And then he hears the door fall shut.

 

\-- + --

 

There are gasps behind him, panicked and hysterical, but it takes Dean a moment longer until he realizes what happened.

That Sam went back. Inside.

"You selfsacrificing son of a bitch!"

Horror grips him tight, flooding his whole body.

"Sam!" he screams and he feels like he's screaming half his strength out and all his heart. He hastily gets up from the floor and stumbles through the kitchen, almost falls down the stairs in his panic. He hears the girls scream his name but he doesn't stop. He reaches the door to the storage room and the hinges pierce through his ears as he opens it, shattering right through his soul.

The room behind the door is empty.

Sam is gone.

"Dammit," Dean curses through gritted teeth and he grips the door tight, feels the adrenaline rush through his body and Dean pants and closes his eyes.

 

"Dean."

Dean swivels around, his fury only growing at the familiar voice behind him.

"What the hell took you so long, Cas?!" he shouts, feels his anger cutting through his throat. "We needed you in there!"

"I'm sorry, Dean," Cas answers, dark and stoic as ever and despite all the emotion whirling inside Dean's body, it doesn't fail to soothe him just a little. "I couldn't find you."

"What the hell does it mean, you couldn't find us? You're an angel for chrissake! And I fucking prayed to you!" Dean knows he's being unfair, knows he's letting it all out on Castiel but he's three days over the point where he cares.

Castiel only blinks, twice, probably his reaction to being hurt personally - Dean still hasn't figured that out - before he goes on. "There's something ... weird about this place. I could hear you, but whenever I tried to get closer, you vanished."

Dean sighs and closes his eyes. He rubs his hand over his mouth, trying desperately to get grip on himself. "So you can't find Sam in there or the sonovabitch who's doing all this?"

Castiel doesn't answer right away. Only when Dean looks up and meets the angel's eyes, does he tilt his head a little. "I'm sorry, Dean," he says and isn't that the only thing he ever keeps saying to Dean?

"Alright," Dean finally gives in, feels the exhaustion biting at him, pulling him down. The adrenaline is fading fast and he needs all the strength he has left to find his brother in there. To get him out.

 

"You don't happen to have some water, food and batteries on you, do you?" Dean jokes and sees Castiel twist his face in confusion. His mind is racing already. He's going to go back in there, but he needs supplies first, can't go in wildheaded. It could take days again until he finds Sam, even more until they get back out. He needs ...

"I didn't bring anything with me," Castiel states as if Dean doesn't know it, as if Dean had actually been serious.

And the next second, Castiel is gone.

"Well, thanks for nothing," Dean says under his breath, throwing up his arms and then he turns around, aiming for the stairs again.

Castiel is standing in front of him, the distant flutter of his wings reaching Dean's ears.

"What the.. ?"

The angel extends his arm and only now Dean notices the dark green duffel bag in Castiel's hand.

"What is this?" Dean doesn't wait for an answer. He grabs the bag and glances in.

For a second, Dean is all but speechless.

"You are awesome," he tells the angel, his voice dead serious. When he meets Castiel's eyes, the angel only nods, his face blank.

Dean doesn't waste another second. He shoulders the bag and turns for the door.

 

"Dean, be careful."

Dean turns back around and finds Castiel's worried eyes on him.

"It's ... it's feeding off Sam," the angel tries to explain.

Dean goes cold. "It's what?"

"The house. Sam is like an open wound to it. Bleeding off emotions. I guess, it's picking up on it, using it."

"Using it for what?" Dean demands.

The angel shrugs slightly. "I don't know, Dean. I can ... see some of what it's doing. But it's not much. I'm afraid I can't help you much."

Dean stares at Castiel a moment longer, considers his options. But in the end he knows he has to go in now. Find Sam now. No matter what's waiting for him in there.

He nods to Castiel one last time and goes, the others upstairs long pushed to the very back of his mind.


	11. chapter c - part four

The moment Dean lets the door of the second storage room fall shut behind him, everything's different. He's felt the shift this time in the first room, felt the ... tilt in the atmosphere, the tiniest movement beneath his feet.

Here, now that he's stepped into the room with the pirate's chest and saw it vanishing, it looks different, too, colder and emptier. Darker.

It's the same living room they've seen before, the same old carpet on the floor, the same worn out sofas. But the dust is back, thicker now and there's a stale smell attacking Dean's nostrils.

There's also a faint noise in the air, a melody, strangely out of place with its modern rhythm and bass. But Dean can't yet place it.

He doesn't waste time though. He has to find Sam.

He opens the next door and shuts it behind himself immediately. He remembers the room with the red curtains, knows it hasn't been dangerous.

But when Dean lets go of the door, the room doesn't change the right way.

There are no red curtains, no hardwood floor.

Dean stands in a simple motel room, one like hundreds of those Sam and Dean have slept in.

The walls are green, and there's a window facing the parking lot where Dean can see a few cars, he can even see their license plates. He sees the Impala among them.

"Austin?" he asks himself out loud and his own voice startles him for a split second.

There are two queens in the room, but only one obviously slept in, although the bed is made almost perfectly.

Dean looks around.

On the wall by the bathroom door are little notes, pictures and cut out parts of newspaper articles. Dean walks closer, looks at the notes written neatly next to the headlines.

It's about vampires. And the writing is Sam's.

Dean looks around again, looks closer at the room itself. He doesn't remember ever being here, ever having done a vampire job in Austin, Texas.

"Jesus Christ," Dean swears and closes his eyes for a second when he realizes where he is.

This is not a memory of their motel room, it's Sam's motel room. Only Sam's.

When Dean was dead, or in Hell, or wherever.

Dean swallows heavily as his eyes fall back to the second bed.

He wonders how long Sam had kept taking two-bed rooms.

 

\-- + --

 

It stays like that.

The rooms change, yes, just like before, some belonging together, some not. But it's only ever motel rooms.

Sometimes Dean gets a look at a kitchen or a bathroom, one time even the motel-lobby, but it's never, not once, a room Dean has seen before.

And they all look disturbing, empty in a way that has nothing to do with the furniture. There are always two beds, made up neatly, but it only looks like one person is staying in there.

Dean recognizes Sam's duffel each and every time.

It's sickening how many there are. Objectively he knows that Sam has been hunting without him, knows that he must have driven around the country to do so, but it never occurred to Dean how lonely it must have been, how many nameless motel rooms Sam must have crossed.

And why have there always been two beds?

For a moment, Dean considers someone going with him, maybe Bobby, or hell, even Ruby; but he pushes that thought to the side, knows it's stupid anyway.

 

It's another motel room Dean's never been in when he notices what is wrong with the whole thing.

The room doesn't look much different than all the others: Two beds, one small table, a kitchenette on one side, the door to the bathroom on the other. There's a window again where Dean can see the parking lot, but it's only the Impala sitting there, no indication of where this is. Or has been.

Dean shakes his head.

But there's an indication of when.

Dean finds a newspaper on the floor by the door; probably this was one of the nicer motels where you get the morning paper with your stay. It's whole and not cut to pieces like the ones on the wall, and Dean finds the date.

At first it doesn't hit him, only fills him with a strange feeling, a tingling in the back of his mind.

The newspaper is from June 7, 2008.

"I haven't been dead yet in 2008," Dean mumbles, out loud, and he jerks again at the sound of his own voice.

Dean remembers that summer, remembers when his deal was looming over them, coming due too soon, no matter how far away. He remembers spending June hunting, with Sam. Alive.

"Sam, what the hell is happening to you?" Dean asks into the empty room, nothing but the echo of his own voice answering.

 

\-- + --

 

The moment the next room changes, Dean is startled, hard enough to let go of the door.

It's another motel room. The wallpaper grey-ish brown on three walls, one made of tiles Dean almost can't see because they're covered with maps and newspaper articles and blurry surveillance photos.The floor has a blue cold tone, the painting on the wall over the old TV maybe older than Dean is.

There's a table on the left side, completely empty, with two chairs facing each other, made of aluminium, and they look cheap and cold and not comfy at all.

The room only has one bed.

Sam is sitting on it.

And he looks horrible.

"Jeez, Sammy." Dean wants to take a step towards his brother but Sam looks up and meets his eyes and Dean is frozen to the spot.

Sam blinks at him, dark circles under his eyes, his face lifeless, like a mask made of stone. His brother closes his eyes for a moment, blinks again and looks up to Dean, as if he's making sure he's not dreaming.

And then Sam laughs, cold and empty and there's a shudder going through Dean's body.

"This is good," Sam says, his voice rough. Darker, older. And Jesus, they've only been separated for a few hours now.

"You're trying a new method now? Showing me my deepest desires instead of my greatest fears?"

Sam has his head turned upwards, talking to somebody Dean can't see, and for a moment he believes Sam has gone crazy, or soulless again, or both.

But he sees the tremble on his brother's lips, sees the pain behind the stoic eyes and he knows his brother is still there.

"Dude, it's me." Dean crosses the distance between them and Sam shoots up, his hand reaching for something behind him. His gun, Dean knows.

"Stay back," Sam orders and he looks taller like that, more dangerous.

An uneasy feeling shoots down Dean's spine.

"Sammy," Dean tries again and raises both hands. "It's me."

Sam closes his eyes again, breathes deeply, then blinks them open. His face changes when his gaze settles on Dean, something breaking in the stone cold facade he was wearing.

"Dean?" Sam breathes and he sounds like he's a kid again, and Dean feels the sudden urge to hug his brother, tell him it will all be okay.

But Dean does nothing, just waits for Sam to believe it, to let himself believe, and he wonders what his brother could have gone through in the last few hours that could have been bad enough to leave Sam like this.

Sam doesn't move, although he sways closer to Dean, unconsciously seeking his brother's presence, but he doesn't make the step. So, Dean does it for him.

He crowds into Sam's personal space, not touching him, just standing close enough to show him that he's real. That he's there.

Dean knows that they're fucked up and wrong that this is all he can do. Then Sam breaks there, silently, in front of him and Dean feels so torn about getting closer or running away that he does nothing. Just stands there, hoping that it will be enough.

They die for each other, they sell their souls and live a life in danger, everything for the other, but they can't share a simple touch, a simple comfort.

Dean has never learned how.

The change in Sam is noticeable, his whole posture shrinking, and suddenly he is a little more like the Sam Dean knows: his face sadder, yes, but more alive.

"So this is your worst fear? This is what Hell looked like for you?" Dean takes a step back, looking around, trying to wrap his mind around this room and why Sam got stuck here, why this is supposed to be worse than everything else.

He can't see it.

"Dean, it's not Hell. This is worse."

And Dean's eyes fly back up to his brother, the grief in Sam's voice touching something deep inside him. And the song keeps playing in the background.

Sam sighs. He looks like he just decided to let all out, to come clean.

Dean doesn't know if he really wants to hear what Sam has to say anymore.

"This is Wednesday," Sam explains and for a second Dean can't follow. "After Broward County. I don't know when ... after. Months, I guess."

Sam shrugs and Dean shivers, feeling himself grow cold. He remembers Sam telling him about the Tuesdays, yes, dozens of them, maybe a hundred. But Sam never said something about Wednesday. There's something Dean didn't know, something big, that Sam never told him.

"You died on that Wednesday, Dean. You died and you stayed dead. About six months."

Dean is at loss for words, he gulps heavily but his mouth is dry; he's staring at his brother in horror.

After everything that happened, after the angels and the devil and the Apocalypse, after them dying over and over again, this still seems like something worse.

"This room," Sam looks away, turns away from Dean completely as if he can't bear the emotions playing on Dean's face. "It's the first room I took with only one bed. I didn't even realize it at first. The clerk asked and I must have told him but I was so ... shocked when I first came in here and there was only this bed, only this single one."

Sam draws in a shuddery breath. "It's the first time I realized that you were really dead. Really gone."

"So this is you going all crazy hunter?" Dean asks and his voice breaks for a second. Anger builds inside him, anger at Sam for losing himself like this, at giving himself up like this. "I heard Bobby tell me some stories from the time I've been ... away. Dude, you can't just..."

"Dean," Sam stops him and smiles, bitter and sad and kind of amused.

He shrugs, as if it's the simplest thing. "This is me without you."

 

\-- + --

 

Dean feels hit. A perfect strike right where it hurts. He knows who he turns into without Sam, the first time not even surviving a week before selling his own soul, the second time living like a zombie for a whole year, hollow, empty. Only a shell of his former self.

But he never knew, never even thought that it would be the same for Sam.

 

"Okay, Sam, we should go." Dean says after a long moment of silence, shaking that weird feeling off his chest as much as he can. They need to focus now.

"I don't know if we can."

"What?" Dean swivels around.

"Dean, do you see another door in this room?" And he says it like it means nothing, casually, the sadness and the fear still clinging to him more than Dean had realized.

And he finds that Sam is right. The door behind had vanished as soon as Dean had lost the grip on the doorhandle, and the bathroom doesn't change.

"Jesus, Sam!" Dean curses, angry at himself for letting go of that damn door.

"You shouldn't have come back," Sam states, stubborn and self-sacrificing Winchester that he is and Dean doesn't even grace that with an answer. They both know that Dean not coming back had never been an option.

"Oh, you shut up!" Dean explodes. "Sam, shut the hell up and help me look, alright. I'm not dying in this damn room and neither are you!"

The song - singing in the background - suddenly picks up, swelling to an almost unbearable volume. He still doesn't recognize it.

"And what the hell is that song? It's driving me insane!"

"It's Asia." Sam huffs a laugh. "When I'm lucky. Huey Lewis when I'm not."

Dean stares at his brother, wide eyes, shocked. He doesn't understand any of this.

But the look on his face must have finally triggered something in Sam.

"Dean, dammit, I'm sorry, Dean ..." Sam shudders, shakes himself, as if he's trying to wake up, trying to clear his mind. He rubs his hands over his face, takes a deep breath.

"I didn't ... we will find a way out, okay? Just let me ... let me think, alright? You being here ... that kind of broke the spell, you know? Somehow?" It's more of a question than a reassurance, but Dean feels himself calm down a little. "So there needs to be a way out."

"Sam, relax, alright? I don't understand anything of what you're saying."

His brother takes a deep breath. "This room. It was supposed to kill me, show me my worst fear. You, being here, kinda defeats the purpose." Sam smiles for a moment, and Dean gets it now, he does. It still sends a shiver down his spine.

He never wanted to be part of Sam's worst fear.

Dean settles on the floor, sits down and leans against the wall. "Alright, what options do we have?"

Sam follows suit, lets himself rest on the bed.

"We can't break windows or doors," Dean reminds them, his gaze flickering up to the window with the curtains drawn shut. "What about fire?"

Sam shakes his head. "Not an option. Didn't you see Amy? That was real fire when she touched us, but nothing around her caught it. I bet nothing's gonna burn in here."

"You sure?"

"I tried it, Dean."

They grow silent, each absorbed with their own thoughts.

Dean's eyes travel through the room, stopping shortly on the chairs, the TV, the bed. Then he really stops.

"Oh," Dean laughs. "Now that's just too easy."

He gets up from the floor and walks over to Sam.

"What?"

"Get up from the bed, Sam," Dean tells his brother.

"Dean, what's...?"

Dean's impatient, pulling his brother up to his feet. "Oh for God's sake, Sam, would you just help me a little?"

Together they push the bed a few feet away, the floor groaning under the weight.

Dean smirks as Sam catches his eyes, surprise evident on his brother's face.

Dean looks down at his discovery, the thing layered with dust, but the ring still moves when Dean tries it, the wood protesting, screeching as he pulls it on its hinges.

"See, Sammy? A door."

 

\-- + --

 

"I found out what's going on."

Dean raises an eyebrow.

He walks next to his brother, both of them searching the area before taking another turn, closing another door. They're walking through tunnels, mostly. Long stretched hallways, sometimes a small room with a chair or a bed.

Dean is happy with all of them. It means the motel rooms are gone.

"You remember the letters I took from Thomas James' study?"

Dean nods, remembering vaguely.

"I totally forgot about them, I only found them when I got stuck ... in that room." He doesn't meet Dean's eyes and Dean wonders if Sam will ever tell him what happened in there, what he'd seen.

"What does Thomas James write about?" he asks instead, curious about what Sam found out.

"That's the thing," Sam replies and there's almost a smile ghosting on his face. "Thomas James did not write them. They're from Daniel Entler."

"The owner of the hotel? Who did he write too? And why did Thomas have them?"

Sam shrugs. "He probably stole them, or caught them before they could be delivered, I don't know. But Daniel wrote to his brother, Joseph."

"So why would Thomas James, owner of the pub, care about what Daniel wrote to his brother? Did they want to get him out of the business? Kill him? What?"

"Umm, no." Sam actually blushes, a deep red, and Dean only stares at his brother, doesn't know what that's all about. "They were love letters."

"Love letters?" Dean hears his voice reach a level that should be entirely too embarrassing for him.

Sam nods. "Daniel and Joseph were ... lovers. Secretly of course. They had to hide it and somehow, Thomas must have found out about it."

"But they were ... brothers," Dean states, feels dumb to be doing so, but he's still at the lovers part.

Sam meets his eyes, doesn't say anything, doesn't need to, and suddenly something clicks into place and Dean's cheeks flame up and his heart leaps in his chest. He looks away.

"So Thomas James found out about their relationship and then what?"

"He tried to kill them." Sam coughs, seems to pick up his courage. "In the letters, Daniel Entler talks about it, about how scared he is for his and Joseph's safety and that he thinks that Thomas James might know something. Thomas was a man of God, very devoted. He must have hated them profoundly."

Again something hot flares over Dean's neck, through his veins. Guilt, he knows. He pushes it back into the darkest corner of his mind.

"Did he succeed?"

Sam shrugs. "I'm not sure."

"Okay, but ..." Dean thinks it over in his head. "If he killed either one or two of them or not, why is he still here? The Entler brothers are dead by now either way."

Sam catches his eyes. "Dean, I'm not so sure."

"You're kidding."

"Dean, what if I'm right? What if Daniel Entler is still here somewhere and all Thomas James is trying to do is kill him?

Sam waits for Dean to say something, but Dean doesn't.

"Please, trust me on this."

Dean considers their options. But Sam is so hellbent on solving this case and stopping this ... house or thing or whatever, there are not many choices left.

"How are we supposed to find him in here?"

Sam's face lights up, not like it used to, not the beautiful happy glow Sam wore as a kid, but Dean can still see it in the weak imitation of it.

"If he's still here, he's in the Secret Room."

Dean glares. "Are you gonna make me repeat it before you tell me what the hell that is?"

His brother grins. "Daniel and Joseph had a secret room built in here. Where they could meet in private and nobody would disturb or see them. I think we just gotta find it."

Dean huffs. He has the distinct feeling that it's not gonna be that easy.

 

\-- + --

 

"Sam, this is ridiculous." It breaks out of Dean finally, the urge to say it sitting on his tongue for far too long now. "How do we even know how to find this damn room? This house is a maze, remember? It could take us days, weeks! Hell, we could walk through this building forever and never find it."

"Just trust me, Dean," Sam says, kind of mysteriously, and Dean wants to ask him about it, but then they come around a corner and are faced with the next door.

Sam closes it behind them, and Dean whistles through his teeth.

It's not a single room they walk into, but the entrance hall of a house. There are stairs going up to the next floor and door upon doors that Dean can see.

And they're all wide open.

"It's a dorm," Sam assumes and Dean has to agree with him, catching sight of a row of beds through one of the doors.

There's a kitchen on Dean's left and he doesn't hesitate to check it out.

This part of the house is not dark but filled with sunlight from the windows up high. It doesn't smell bad at all, a fresh scent lying in the air. There's no dust on the furniture, no dirt in the corners.

And there's running water in the faucet.

Dean can't find any food but it doesn't matter. He still has the stuff Castiel gave him.

"Sam?" he calls his brother and waits for him to follow him into the kitchen. "Time for dinner." Dean grins at him and produces the things Castiel put in the duffel, bottles of water, a coke, apples and sandwiches and Dean can't keep the grin off his face.

"Did you get all that?" Sam asks incredulously but Dean can spot the excitement on his brother's face and God, he doesn't even remember when was the last time they ate.

"Nope, Cas gave it to me right before I got back in."

"Cas?" Sam's eyes shoot up.

Dean's mood sinks. For a second, he forgets where they are, why they are here, and how trapped and on their own they are. "He can't get in," Dean explains as he divides the food, giving Sam his half. "He can't locate anything from outside."

"So, he can't help us," Sam concludes.

"He gave us this." Dean waves the sandwich and earns a small smile from his brother.

They eat in relative silence, not much too talk about and both of them too engaged in their own thoughts.

 

That is, until an idea forms in Dean's head.

"Dean, where are you going?"

The shout follows him as he leaves the kitchen, runs around the entrance hall to look into the other rooms. When he doesn't find what he's looking for, he takes the stairs.

"Dean!"

Sam runs after him, their combined footsteps creating a loud echo.

"Pray, Sammy," Dean says as he enters a room to their left.

The showers.

He tentativly makes a step forward to the first shower on the right, hoping for the best, and he reaches out for the faucet and turns it. It creaks, the pipes rattle, but then, a minute later, clean, hot water is coming out of the shower head.

"Whohooo!" Dean lets out and he decides he can be embarrassed later. A shower has never seemed as promising as it does right now.

Dean turns back to his brother, feels a grin stretching his face, and Sam only shakes his head, can't keep the smile off his own face and it does something to Dean's insides.

"You're unbelievable, Dean."

"Yeah," Dean retorts," but you love me for it."

He only notices what he's said when Sam's answer seems to get stuck in his throat, the "Yes," way too gentle than he had probably intended.

Dean feels himself flush, and turns away, the wonderful sound of water hitting the ground still singing in his ears.

"Okay, who's first?"

 

They find towels in one of the drawers, old and thin, but they're dry and more than perfect for them. They decide to take turns, one watching out while the other is under the shower and Dean is first, feeling vulnerable - being naked in this house. But his skin is itching; his hair glued to his head and the smell of sweat and dirt is clinging to him for days now.

They don't have a change of clothes, but a shower is all Dean needs right now.

He makes it quick, doesn't give in to the urge to draw it out and enjoy some time under the hot water massaging his skin.

Sam is just around the corner, waiting for his turn, and Dean can't predict how much water they have or when the next monster will appear out of thin air.

With reluctance, he steps out from the shower, doesn't dare to turn it off. He towels himself off as good as possible, and wraps the thin fabric around his lower body to get Sam. It's not cold in here, room temperature, so he won't start freezing soon.

"Sam?"

Dean realizes his mistake the second his brother's eyes fall on him. Sam's gaze flickers from his face down his body and right back up, deep red painting his brother's cheek.

"It's your turn," Dean tells him, his voice coming out rougher than he expected.

Sam lowers his eyes and walks by him, careful not to get too close.

Dean feels regret pool in his belly. It's not supposed to be like this, they are not supposed to be like this, tip toeing around each other, second guessing every move. He doesn't want Sam to look at him and feel self aware.

It's instinct mostly, and acting before he can over think it, as he reaches out and catches his brother on his wrist.

"Dude," Dean says, plastering the dirtiest grin he can muster on his face. "Make sure you don't drop the soap." He winks at Sam, watching his brother turn a beautiful shade of red all over.

But then Sam tugs himself free, a fit of laughter bursting out of him, and Dean counts it as a victory when Sam rounds the corner, smiling at him.

 

"You wanna sleep downstairs? In the dorm?" Sam asks him when they're both showered and dressed again. They're as good as clean as they can get now, bellies filled with food, and Dean can feel the exhaustion tug at his bones.

He shakes his head. Coming up here, he's seen a bedroom on the other side of the showers. It has a huge king-size bed and in its time, it probably belonged to the headmaster of the school. And the room downstairs is not safe enough, too big, too many possibilities for something to hide.

"What about here?" Dean nods to it as Sam follows him across the hallway.

Sam stares. "Are you sure?" he asks under his breath.

Dean stomach churns. "Of course I am, you moron." He slaps his brother around the back of the head, smirking as Sam ducks and answers with an "Ouch, that hurt, you jerk", and for a second, it feels just like old times.

They move closer to the bed and only now that Dean is seeing it from this angle, does he notice something odd.

"That is some huge ass chandelier," Dean laughs and walks around the thing, lying on the floor at the foot of the bed. It's made of iron, once maybe with a golden shine to it but now Dean can only see traces of it, and it must weigh a ton, it's so big.

Dean looks up, finds the hooks broken on the ceiling. He's glad that he hasn't been standing under it when the thing crashed down.

"Are you coming?" Dean asks his brother as he gets into the bed, Sam still standing by the door, unsure and nervous.

God, Dean hates to see him like that.

"Seriously, Sam, cut that shit out. Don't friggin' treat me like raw egg or something. Move over here and get your ass into this bed."

And Dean promises himself that this is all he is ever going to say about their little ... incident.

Sam follows when Dean's already lying down. He punches his pillow into the right form, and feels sleep catching him immediately.

It's not entirely dark in here, the hall lamp offering a bright light, but Dean is not very keen on finding out how to turn it off. Doesn't need to either. He's sure he can sleep anywhere at the moment.

He feels the bed dip when Sam finally joins him, hears the rustle of clothes as his brother tries to find a position.

Dean opens his eyes and finds Sam at the very end of the bed, as if he's afraid that Dean would freak out. Draw the line between them.

Dean falls asleep with the vague, disturbing thought that he never knew that this line needed to be drawn.


	12. chapter d

_Sioux Falls, South Dakota_

 

Bobby was a little surprised when, on the third day, Dean finally entered the kitchen on his own two feet. He still looked pale and wobbly on his legs, but he was walking, even though Sam kept looming like a shadow behind him, ready to catch his brother's fall if necessary.

"How are you feeling, son?" Bobby asked and watched a wry smile cross Dean's face.

"I'll be fine," came the answer, his voice rough like sandpaper and betraying the bravado Dean was trying to wear.

Bobby got up from his desk, shutting the book he was reading on, and walked over to the boys.

"Jeez, sit down boy before you fall down," Bobby told him, pulling a chair away from the table.

Sam had an iron grip on his brother as he slowly let him down to sit.

"I'll be fine, guys, just give me a minute, alright?" He looked annoyed but he still winced when he finally sat, out of breath like he just ran a marathon.

Bobby watched him and his brother. Sam waited, as if to make sure that his brother was sitting and not falling off the chair any second. Only then did he let go of Dean and took his own chair.

Close enough to his brother that he was practically sitting on his lap.

All the while, Dean looked like he was falling asleep at the table, and Sam wore a face like he was ready to kill the damn thing if his brother would keel over and hit his head on the hard wood.

"What the hell happened to you two?" Bobby finally asked, not having the faintest clue on why the two boys he knew for a while now would act so out of character.

Or, Bobby corrected himself in his head, more like the overdrawn, exaggerated caricature of themselves.

"Sam didn't tell you what happened?" Dean asked, throwing a confused glance to his brother.

Neither Sam nor Bobby answered.

Dean wiped over his face, a tired gesture, and Bobby watched Sam's eyes flicker worriedly over his brother and there was something so ... off about it. Something more intense than usual.

"It was a case back in Virginia," Dean started.

"But that was last week? Didn't you boys call me right before you started it?"

Dean's eyes flicker up to him.

"We were trapped in that house for four days."

"Jesus." Bobby remembered the case vaguely, or better, the few details he had known about it. Dean had called and told him where they were heading and later Bobby had talked to Sam and forwarded some research about Rumsey Hall, the supposedly haunted building there in Shepherdstown.

"So it was no joke. Real haunting?"

Dean licked his lips and Bobby saw Sam's eyes draw to it. It looked like Sam was monitoring his brother's every move and Bobby really started to get a little uncomfortable.

"No joke."


	13. chapter d - part one

_Shepherdstown, West Virginia_

 

Sam's heart is beating fast as soon as he wakes up. He's wide awake the minute his eyes open and fall on Dean. His brother is still sleeping peacefully; Sam watches his chest rise and fall in a slow and steady rhythm.

The song still plays in the background, but this close to Dean, Sam almost can't hear it.

Just like he almost can't smell the rotten flesh in the corner, just like he can pretend he doesn't see the body ripped apart by claws lying there out of the corner of his eyes.

Dean is here.

Solid and breathing and warm and living.

Sam is lying close enough that their bodies touch, shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, and Sam feels his brother's warmth seep through his own skin where their legs touch.

It's still not good enough.

He needs to get closer still, so he does; he buries his nose in the crook of Dean's neck, breathes his brother in, brushes over his brother's sleep warm skin and it's not a big step, not even a conscious decision when he sneaks out his tongue and lets it touch Dean's shoulder, his throat, the spot behind his ear. His lips follow, making it little kisses, making it more real, and soon Sam is dizzy with Dean's taste and with Dean's smell and with Dean, being so close.

He feels his brother stir under him, knows Dean is starting to wake up, but Sam is not stopping. He slides his hand under his brother's shirt, finds his heartbeat beneath his chest and Sam's fingers tingle with the sensation.

His mouth finds Dean's collarbone, and Sam already loves Dean's skin under his lips, loves the feeling of it, the warmth.

He travels further, rolls over, so he's completely covering his brother, and he lets his teeth slide over the flesh where shoulder meets neck, bites down a little and earns a groan from Dean.

His brother is awake now.

Dean's arms come up, one is catching Sam's hip, the other his shoulder, and for a second, Sam is sure that Dean's pushing him away, but his brother is only holding onto him for now.

"Dean," Sam breathes out and he continues his journey, continues mapping out his brother's skin.

The hand on Dean's heart begins to caress, starts to touch, to explore there too. Sam has his brother's shirt up and his lips dip lower, gliding over his chest, down his ribs, down his belly.

Dean's breathing is stronger now, faster, and Sam gets intoxicated by holding his head just above Dean's belly, his breath only hitting the little blonde hairs that stand up, getting to feel Dean on his lips with every token breath.

Sam's tongue finds Dean's belly button and Dean groans above him, louder this time.

"Jesus, fuck, Sammy, what are you doing?" Dean whispers hoarsely and he sounds strange, sounds different than all the other times Sam can remember.

It's arousal, Sam realizes a second later and he is hit with the meaning of it.

It's desperation and confusion and anger and sadness, yes, but above all of that, it's Dean, aroused. For him.

Sam bites down on the delicate skin right where Dean's boxers begin and Dean is grabbing him now, hauling him up.

Sam meets his eyes for a second, sees all of it in there, all he has already heard in Dean's voice, before he's pulled down and their lips meet.

It's nothing like the first time.

They're hungry for it, both of them, giving in like everything they are, they were two minutes ago, doesn't matter.

The first touch of their tongues is electric, feels meant to be to Sam, and he knows the sounds he makes are needy and desperate. But Dean clings just right back to him, holding onto his shoulders as Sam's hands grab Dean's head to angle them just right, to get that bit deeper, that bit closer.

They kiss until they have to come up for air; they kiss until their tastes have faded and they only taste like them; they kiss until their lips are numb and their tongues get heavy.

They kiss until Sam can feel his hairs stand up for a completely different reason, until he can feel another presence in the room.

They kiss until the ghost of Thomas James shows up behind them and fires his gun.

 

\-- + --

 

Sam is faster though.

He pulls Dean with him, rolls them off the bed with a loud crash and Dean lands with a hard knock and a painful groan beneath him.

Sam doesn't waste any time.

He's on his feet immediately, crosing the room in two big steps, and with the strength of adrenaline and desperation, heaves the heavy chandelier in the air, just to drop it over the flickering monster in front of them.

The ghost of Thomas James goes down under the weight, trapped by the metal rings.

He falls back on the floor as soon as he's done, watching the ghost watching them, trying to catch his breath.

He turns his head to his brother, who is still sitting on the floor, staring open-mouthed at him. He's not looking at the monster they just caught, doesn't even seem to care that there's a ghost in the room with them.

His eyes are glued to his brother.

Dean's shirt is still up to his shoulder, showing off his belly, showing off little red fading marks that Sam left with his teeth. His brother's lips are still obscenely plush and red and Sam knows that he did that. That he made his brother look like that.

He also knows that it's an image he will never be able to forget.

Sam's eyes meet his brother's. Silence stretches between them, thick and heavy, and charged with something that's pressing the air out of Sam's lungs.

They stare at each other, just stare. In shock and horror and surprise, and Sam can't move, can't do anything but stay under the weight of his brother's eyes on him.

Sam feels himself burning up, feels like he's bursting into ashes under Dean's scrutiny. Feels like he's dying.

It isn't hatred Sam can see, or disgust or anger. It's just the simple look of surprise. As if Dean doesn't know the man he's looking at.

Dots start swimming in front of Sam's eyes. There's a prickle at the back of his neck, his fingertips tingling. He feels like he's going to faint.

 

\-- + --

 

He doesn't.

Instead he gets up from the floor, and sees that his brother is doing the same.

"Why isn't he vanishing?" Dean asks him, his eyes now trained on the ghost of Thomas James who is still sitting silently in his circle.

"The iron," Sam explains, waiting for Dean to walk closer, to stand next to him.

Dean doesn't.

"His own hatred is making him too solid to just vanish, the metal traps him there."

"Neat." Dean grins, but it's not a real smile, it's cold and disgusted.

It's meant for the monster sitting on the floor in front of them and Sam buries the sudden fear inside him that he will be the next person Dean is gonna look at like that.

"We gotta go," Sam says from where he's standing, risking a glance to Dean and sees that his brother is trying very hard not to look at him.

His heart sinks. The fear, humming at the back of his neck, grows bigger.

The song gets louder.

"You just gonna leave him there?" Dean asks but has already turned around to pick up his duffel.

"He's not going anywhere and we need to find Daniel Entler."

"Alright." Dean waits for him at the door. "You comin'?" he asks, his eyes never quite reaching up to Sam's face.

 

\-- + --

 

It's bad, this time. Real bad.

Dean is not looking at him, the back he has turned to Sam is rigid and wrong, Dean's jaw clenched so hard that it must hurt.

Sam feels sick to his stomach.

He follows Dean always two steps behind, and they don't talk, don't even look at each other.

 

They find the only door that changes the next room in a small study right under the stairs. Sam closes it behind them, watching as the small room stretches into a ballroom. There are mirrors on the wall, chairs lined up on two sides.

The music is deafening in here, the song playing so loud as if it's trying to make Sam dance, an odd, twisted music echoing off the ancient walls.

Dean doesn't turn when Sam draws in a sharp breath, although he must have heard it.

Sam finds a version of dead-Dean in the mirrors, finds hundredths of them in there, and he can't look away, the whole room showing to back at him, burning it into his eyes.

His steps falter, his breath hitches. He can't take it anymore.

Dean only realizes that Sam has stopped when he's almost on the other side, hand already reaching out for the next door.

"Sam?"

His brother turns towards him and Sam can only stare at him, can only try to keep his eyes fixed on the one living Dean among hundreds of dead ones.

"Sammy, are you alright?" Dean asks, and he is still so angry, his face shut off.

"Dean, please," Sam whispers, knows that his brother can see his lips moving but must not hear a thing.

"Sam, come on. We gotta go." Dean is impatient, his hands pulled to fists, and he still doesn't meet Sam's eyes.

Sam's sadness turns into anger; warm, familiar heat is flaring up his spine and he knows this, is used to this when it comes Dean.

"Dean, don't do this," he says, loud enough for his brother to hear.

"What?"

Sam huffs. "You damn well know what. Don't act like this, don't act like it was nothing, don't ..."

"Sam, what do you want from me, huh?" His brother stretches out his arms. "You did what you had to do, let's leave it at that."

Sam feels his gut clench. "Are you even listening to yourself? How can you believe that? After everything you know?"

"It was necessary, it was a dick move and really fucking shady of you not to let me in on your plan, but it was fucking necessary, so can we just fucking stop talking about it?"

Sam stares at his brother in disbelief, open mouthed. "Dean," he starts. "If you know that it was necessary what I did, what we did, to make the ghost of Thomas Entler appear, then you also know why. You also know that he only ever showed up around us."

He takes a step forward, a step towards his brother, and Dean is looking like a trapped animal, ready to fight for his life.

"Then you realized that he only ever showed up when you touched me."

Dean's jaw tightens, his eyes blazing, but Sam can see his cheeks flaming.

"Dean, then you know that we were only able to summon him, because there is ... something ... between us."

"Sam," Dean warns, but Sam doesn't let himself be stopped.

"Because I didn't fake it. Because I'm in ..." Sam swallows heavily, the words stuck in his throat and Dean's eyes are wide, knowing what Sam is trying to say. "Because I want all that. For real."

Dean's face breaks. The anger vanishes, suddenly replaced by complete despair. "But, Sammy, how can you?" he asks, his voice shredded, and Sam has a million and no answers for that.

And he doesn't get the chance to give one.

 

He hears the roaring first, the clangor, hears something burst before he sees it.

The mirrors. Breaking. One by one.

"Dean!" he shouts as he's trying to protect himself, raising his arms in the air and covering his face, and he can't see his brother, broken pieces of glass twirling in front of his eyes.

"Dean!" he screams, when he gets sight of his brother.

The glass is raining down him, cutting him, and Dean is pulled, pulled by something Sam can't see. His brother is dragged across the floor, screaming in pain, dragged right into the first mirror.

"Dean!" Sam tries to run, but only gets so far, one shard cuting deep into his leg.

When he reaches the mirror, Dean is gone, only his duffel is lying on the floor.

The sound is gone with him, the broken glass covering the ground, a horrific image of innocence after what it has done.

The room is strangely quiet.

As if it's taking a breath.

Sam startles when another sound attacks his ear, and he swivels around, seeing the door Dean was standing close by fly open, hitting the wall with a heavy crack. More sounds like that follow, more doors opening behind it, like an echo.

Sam knows what it means, knows that it's true, what he suspected all along.

The ghost of Daniel Entler wants to be found. And he's ready for him.

Opening up a path Sam only has to follow.

 

Sam groans as he makes a step, the cut in his leg deep, and it's already bleeding. He pushes the image of his brother aside, the glass hitting him way heavier than Sam, and he simply trusts in the fact that Daniel will have Dean. That Sam will find him there.

 

\-- + --

 

The door to the ballroom falls shut behind Sam, without him touching it, but nothing changes this time. The house presenting him exactly where he needs to be.

It's another hallway.

But things are different here: There's a rug on the floor, clean, and smelling freshly, like it had just been laid out in the sun to dry. There's a small desk against one wall, a pretty little lamp decorating it and Sam can see pictures on the wall, photographs. The same he has seen in the boxes, in a storage room miles and days away.

This hallway looks lived in.

There's no smell of a dead body, no sight of Dean hanging from walls, bleeding, or lying on the floor, dead eyes staring up at him.

And the music has stopped playing.

He's close.

The room must be here somewhere.

He looks around: he has two ways to go, the hallway taking a turn on both ends.

He walks forward and he comes into a dining room, set for a meal for two. Sam feels his chest clench at the sight.

Sunlight falls through the big window over the table. He can see a carriage outside.

There are two open doors on either side, and Sam finds the living room, two small sofas facing a window and a small table is sitting between them. There are more pictures on the wall. More images of the Entler brothers, smiling down at him.

Sam grows impatient, nervous. He needs to find Dean. Before it's too late. He needs to find him.

 

He doesn't waste more time, he searches through the remaining rooms, but no sight of Dean, no trace of the ghost.

There's a study, a second living room and the kitchen, and Sam gets desperate when there is nothing. He finds the stairs, runs up to the second floor and only finds two bedrooms, tidy and pretty, but empty.

He comes to a small door at the end of the hallway. There are stairs leading up, a small corridor, and Sam's heart clenches again, something else making him feel like this.

He doesn't hesitate, taking two steps at once, opening the door at the top.

 

\-- + --

 

The feeling of loss is so intense, that Sam can't breathe for a moment, has to stop at the threshold and hold himself upright on the doorframe. He feels tears stinging in his eyes, feels them close up his throat, but he knows it's not him feeling it, it's not his loss.

Not yet.

"Dean," Sam sobs as he sees his brother, sees him bloody and broken on the floor, and this time he's real, this time Sam knows he's real. "No, no!"

Sam doesn't remember moving, just finds himself at his brother's side, reaching for him, cradling Dean's face in his hands.

There are cuts and bruises everywhere and blood, so much blood, and Sam wants to stop it, wants to find the wound and press it shut with his own hands but there are too many, Dean's clothes are already soaked.

"Dean." His own voice hurts in his throat, cuts it right open, and Dean blinks at him, his chest still moving, his shallow breath still hitting Sam's ear as he leans down to his brother.

"Not your fault," Dean croaks, as if he knows what Sam is thinking, and of course he does, Dean knows him, always did.

But this time Dean is wrong. It is Sam's fault. He is the one that walked back in here, knowing deep down that Dean was going to follow. He pulled his brother back in.

He is the one painting a target on Dean's back just by loving him the way he does.

"It's too late," comes a whisper, rough and old, and Sam's eyes shoot up, his whole body suddenly taut like a spring.

Only now does he see the room, does he notice everything.

It's beautiful, a small bedroom, the bed big enough for two, and there are small tables at either side of it. There's a huge closet against the wall, decorated with carvings of flowers. The carpet is thick on the floor, soft, and the curtains on the window closed, the sun shining through the thin fabric creating a golden light, dancing in the room.

There's a huge armchair sitting in the middle of the room, red, the same carvings on the armrest as on the wardrobe.

And there's an old man, sitting in the chair, smiling down at Sam.

"Too late," he croaks and his smile is bitter. "You are going to lose him, Samuel. Just like you knew you would. Just like it's supposed to be."

"Daniel," Sam gasps, not sure what he sees.

The old man cocks his head. "You know my name. Just like I know yours." He smiles, baring rotten teeth in his mouth.

"You're not a ghost," Sam states, shocked, but he doesn't need to walk closer, doesn't need to touch the old man to know that he's right.

Daniel Entler laughs, hollow and heavy, like it hurts, like every breath hurts. "I wish I was," he whispers and Sam can see that he means it, deeply means it.

Then the old man's face turns cold. "But we can't, Samuel, you and I, we don't deserve to die."

He grins, but Sam is distracted, his eyes falling down to his brother as Dean starts coughing. "Dean." Sam holds him, can't do anything else but hold him.

"You will lose him, Samuel," Daniel keeps on talking and Sam doesn't want to listen, but can't ignore it, each and every word piercing through him. "And then you'll be bound to live forever, bound to this house by a broken heart, feeling the loss every single day."

He laughs again, and Sam hears it now for what it is. Pain. Pain so deep, Sam can taste it in the air.

"What the hell happened to you?" he asks the old man, scared for the answer.

Daniel blinks, shuddering, as if he's remembering something and the thin, white hair on his head move with it. Sam can see dark spots on his head shining through the hair, finds them all over the wrinkled face and he's faintly reminded of mould, shuddering at the thought.

"You know, Joseph, my sweet brother, my beautiful ..." Glassy eyes focus on Sam. "He couldn't live with it. Couldn't live with the ... abomination that we were, that I was. He left. Left me."

The old man swallows, a clicking sound coming from his throat.

"And then he left. For good. Took his favorite hunting rifle."

The old man's hands shake, and for a second Sam can sympathize with him, but he feels nothing but pity.

Until Daniel's face changes again, like waves rolling over his features, turning him into a cold monster once more. "I did this. I killed him. My ... love, my terrible, disgusting love for him killed him. I don't deserve to die, I don't deserve to follow him." He gets louder with every word, centuries old anger, coming through.

"I deserve to feel my failure, every single day for the rest of eternity and so do you, young Samuel. You will feel the loss, you will feel it!"

There is movement beneath Sam and he finds Dean looking up at him, Dean pressing his hand where Sam is clinging to him. "Don't you ...," Dean rattles," fucking listen ... to this ...monster."

Sam tries not to scream against the pain building in his chest.

"Why all the others, why ... trapping them here?" Sam asks because he needs to know. He's frantically looking for an escape, for a way out, to end this.

"I'm not doing it," Daniel whispers, a crazy glint in his eyes. "It's the house. It's feeding. Feeding on me, and on you, and on them."

Sam believes him, understands.

The house built around Daniel, built around all the pain and despair, around the hate from Thomas James, the anger from little Amy. It fed, got bigger and bigger with every emotion, every memory, every fear.

But Sam also knows that Daniel is still the key. Still the host. It's his failure, killing the people, his guilt trapping them and having them face their worst fears.

It's still Daniel who is responsible.

Sam watches the old man turn his head, notices the curtains move in the same way. He remembers the doors opening to bring him here, remembers the chill, the emptiness that had lingered in every room.

Sam realizes with a start that it won't be enough to kill Daniel, the house and him already too connected. Already one.

 

There's a nudge to his arm and Sam looks down, finds his brother pushing something into Sam's palm. A matchbox.

"Dean?" he whispers, not sure what his brother is trying to tell him.

"It'll work in here. Trust me." Dean smiles, as wickedly as he can manage, and Sam follows his brother's gaze.

There are candles standing on one of the tables, three of them arranged on a table cloth. And there are little holes burned into them from the fire. It clicks in Sam's mind, things falling into place. Why nothing caught fire in this house, why nothing could be destroyed.

Only here, only now, can they fight it. And fire is the only thing that the house really fears.

"Dean, no," Sam still shakes his head.

"Kill the host, kill the room, Sammy." Dean presses his hand again and Sam knows he's right. With Daniel dead, maybe they can destroy the whole house.

It's the only chance they have.

Sam nods, keeping the tears back in his throat and gets up from the ground.

"What are you trying to do, Samuel?" the old man asks. "There is no escape."

Sam glances to the side, sees that Daniel is right. The door he came through is gone, a white wall having replaced it.

It doesn't matter.

He lights the first match and holds it against a curtain, the yellow fabric catching it immediately.

"What are you ... No!" Daniel gasps, rattles deep in his throat. "You can't do that. It will kill us all!"

"I know." Sam lights the second one, the cloth on the table burning up slowly, but steadily.

"No! No! We can't ... I can't."

Sam just walks past him, looking down at Daniel, who is nothing more than an old man, too crippled to walk, his hands shaking with every move.

The pillows are next.

"I will not allow it!" Daniel screams and Sam swivels around as he hears the sound of something heavy fall and he only sees the wardrobe the second before it hits him, half burying him underneath.

He feels his bone break, hears it break, before the pain in his leg reaches his mind and Sam screams.

"I will not ..." the old man mutters, again and again, and Sam pulls his leg from underneath the heavy closet, needs to get back to Dean, ignoring the hot, sharp ache shooting down his whole body.

He rolls to the side as the table falls, barely fast enough when the desk crashes to the floor, missing him by only an inch.

 

\-- + --

 

But it's over.

Sam knows this as soon as the sound of the fire drowns out every other one. It bites, it crackles, it screams.

Daniel is still looking at him, his eyes now empty, but peaceful. He doesn't move from his chair, ready to finally take his fate.

Sam crawls over the floor, the two feet that separate him from his brother, and it feels like a mile, like a thousand heartbeats.

He knows he will not be fast enough, knows that there is nothing he can do.

But when he reaches Dean, his brother's chest is still moving, he's blinking heavily and Sam's heart breaks when their eyes meet one last time. Dean coughs, tries to breathe against all the blood in his lungs and Sam finally reaches him, and pulls him up and into his arms.

Dean moans against the pain and his eyes flutter close. Sam touches his brother's cheek, caresses it softly with his thumb. There are lifetimes of shared memories in that touch, lifetimes of 'sorry' and 'goodbye' and 'I love you'.

Above them, the fire has reached the ceiling, sending little sparks down. Like rain.

Sam hauls his brother up in his arms, gets a good enough grip to pull him with him.

They're never gonna make it outside, that's not even the question. Sam's leg is broken, he doesn't know if he would be able to walk himself but he knows he can't carry Dean.

But he can make it to the closet. Away from the fire good enough that the smoke will be quicker. Away from the beams at the ceiling that threaten to come down any second. But more important: away from Daniel Entler who is illuminated by the fire surrounding him, his whole chair in flames, but whose eyes are still on Sam and Dean, and Sam doesn't want to give him the satisfaction, doesn't want to die under his gaze.

He wants this for himself. Wants Dean for himself the last few minutes he has.

Sam makes it to the closet when the first wall breaks. The smoke is already thick and burns in his lungs but he's crawling, down low enough on the ground that he can still see. He sits up, his back to the wall so he can see into the room, can see the fire dancing. He pulls Dean towards him, in between his legs and rests him against his chest.

For a second, the image of Ellen and Jo pops up in his head but he doesn't think about it, pushes the thoughts away.

He buries his face in his brother's neck and he doesn't smell the fire anymore, doesn't smell the dirt and the ash and the sweat and the blood. He only smells Dean, smells the inside of the car, smells the shampoo Dean used when he was fifteen. He smells the gunpowder that was always on Dean's hands and the aftershave he used the morning they came into this town.

Sam kisses Dean's neck, a lingering kiss, and Sam's shaking so hard, his lips trembling against Dean's skin.

Sam's hand has found Dean's heart.

It's not beating anymore.

Sam thinks about Jess, thinks about his dad and his mom. He thinks about Bobby and Castiel, but it's all just on the surface, as if his mind is trying to give him what it's supposed to do, showing him his life one last time before he dies, when his heart can only think of Dean.

He remembers Dean dying. Remembers every single death, and Sam is so damn grateful that this time, he's not gonna be left behind.

Sam's eyes sting from the smoke, his face streaked from tears that started long before that.

He presses Dean closer, engulfing his brother completely in his arms.

Not long now.

 

There's another crash from the room and Sam looks up despite himself, sees the back of the chair now going down in flames, sees the ceiling down on the floor. Sam sees sunshine above them but he might just as well be hallucinating.

But he smiles. He's happy that it's the last thing he sees.

Until the sun gets dark, until even the fire seems to vanish in front of his eyes.

Sam blinks. There's a man blocking his view and he's burning, his coat in flames.

He knows that man.

Castiel has never looked more like an angel than he does now. There's a halo around him, brighter and more beautiful than Sam could have ever imagined. His eyes are still light blue, cool and calm and resting on Sam.

His hand reaches out to Sam.

"Not without him," Sam croaks and it hurts, feels like it's ripping out his insides but his eyes are strong when they meet the angel's.

Castiel nods and touches his fingers to Sam's head.


	14. epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> thank you for going on this ride with me and reading and commenting on it! THANK YOU!
> 
> also: check out the WONDERFUL art made for this story here:  
> http://dark-roast.livejournal.com/73173.html

_Sioux Falls, South Dakota_

 

Silence lay over the house when Bobby walked inside at the end of the day. His hands were dirty with grease and his old bones ached from the day's work, bent over the hood of a car, buried up to his elbows in engines and car parts. He wasn't naive enough to believe his age wasn't going to be a problem soon, but he still savored every time he could spend his time working with his bare hands, rather than being crouched over one book after another.

The boys should have been downstairs, talking or doing whatever the hell they did when they didn't try to gank another monster for a change, but they should have been here making noise, being loud; and they weren't.

"Sam? Dean?" Bobby's voice didn't carry through the house very much, all the old books and things clattered around swallowed the sound, but he felt stupid to be shouting like a maniac in his own home, so he didn't.

Instead he climbed up the stairs, looking for the boys instead.

The silence disturbed him; silence almost never meant something good, not in this house, not with those boys. Concern slowly nagged on Bobby's conscience.

"Dean?" he said, his voice low, as he opened the door to the boys' bedroom.

It was empty.

His steps grew slower and more careful. Bobby knew about six different weapons within his reach - iron candleholders on the board in the hall, an axe behind the door at the end, bags of salt in one of the drawers - and he readied himself for every enemy he could think of right at that moment.

But nothing, not anything at all, would have been able to prepare him for what he found behind the door to the upstairs bathroom, for what he could witness through the small crack where the door was left ajar.

Sam and Dean, leaning against the wall, Dean pressing Sam against it.

Dean kissing Sam.

Dean cradling Sam's head in between his hands, kissing him gently, softly, intimately. Like they have done it before. Like lovers.

For a second, Bobby wanted to walk in on them, wanted to waltz in and shout and push Dean away from his little brother, but then his eyes fell on Sam's hands, buried in Dean's shirt, clawing at his bigger brother, and Bobby was hit with the look on Sam's face as they separated, saw the force of everything Sam was feeling displayed on his face - pain and desperation, hope and want, devotion and love. Love more than anything else.

So Bobby couldn't. Frozen to the spot he was lurking and witnessing the scene before him. He couldn't do anything to prevent it, to stop it. Instead he watched the boys, practically his kids by now, watched Dean with a beating heart pull Sam towards him, watched the taller boy rest his head in the crook of his older brother's neck, watched Sam's whole body tremble and Dean desperately trying to hold his baby brother together.

"I'm scared, Dean," Sam said, his voice broken. "He was just a sad, old man with a broken heart. Look what a monster he became, what power it unleashed. Dean, what if ... what if I end up like him?"

Bobby could see Dean's face clearly, could see the jolt of pain flashing over it. "You won't, Sammy. I won't let you."

Sam turned his face up, pressing a desperate kiss to his brother's lips.

"Sammy," Dean whispered in the space between them. "It's okay. I won't let it happen."

Everything fell into place that moment.

The looks, the touches, everything that had happened in the last few days. And maybe everything that had ever happened between those two boys.

Bobby felt sick. He thought about John, thought about what he would say if he had caught his sons like that. But then he noticed another look on the boys' faces, one he couldn't remember the last time when he had seen it.

Smiles.

Dean was blushing when Sam looked up, but he smiled at his brother, made sure Sam met his eyes.

Their smiles were hesitant and nervous, but genuine. Real. Like the world around them didn't exist, didn't matter. Like all that mattered where them.

Bobby's stomach turned for another reason. If he was honest with himself, he might have never seen them smile like that.

He stepped back eventually, turning around as careful as possible and getting back down, leaving the boys alone.

All he needed was a drink.

 

The End.


End file.
